AN UNKNOWN SON 
OF NAPOLEON 



F 17 



/ 'X-(^ 



AN UNKNOWN SON 
OF NAPOLEON 



BY 

HECTOR FLEISCHMANN 



NEW YORK 

JOHN LANE COMPANY 

MCMXIV 



He ai€ 



TRANSLATED BY 

A. R. ALLINSON, M.A. 






«G 



PREFATORY NOTE 

It is through the notoriety of a succession of 
disreputable scandals, of a series of dubious legal 
proceedings, that the Second Empire, with its little 
secrets, its private and semi-clandestine history, is 
connected with the name of the droll and diverting 
hero whose biography I have undertaken to unravel. 
It is through Léon, the Comte Léon, son of an 
unknown father, that the reign of Napoleon in. 
comes in touch with that of Napoleon i. ; it is a 
page of the uncle's history that is here set down 
at the same time as the nephew's. It may be the 
objection will be raised that the individual dealt 
with, insignificant as a political influence, negligible 
as playing any official part, did not deserve the 
honour of a substantial 8vo volume, that an article 
in a Review would have sufficed to exhaust the 
subject. This is a poor way of reasoning ; it 
betrays an encyclopsedic ignorance to assume that 
nothing is known of a life like this, a life that set 
all the world talking of the lawsuits, the duels, the 
petty rogueries which marked its course, and that 
we can rest content with the mere sketch of 



6 PREFATORY NOTE 

M. Paul Ginisty or the cursory observations of 
Dr. Max Billard, the only two authors who have 
concerned themselves with the Comte Léon. . . . 

I claim for this book neither more nor less in- 
dulgence than for its predecessors. But one thing 
I am bound to insist on, — my gratitude towards 
those who have given their cordial and affectionate 
co-operation in completing the investigations in- 
volved in the work. First and foremost, I must 
mention all I owe to the Baron de Meneval, who 
has graciously consented to draw upon his rich 
family archives for what constitutes the essential 
and unpublished part of my narrative, — matter 
to which History will be indebted for final and 
definite information of the consequences of a 
fugitive liaison of the great Emperor's. Nor must 
I forget to refer to M. Monin, who has provided 
me with an invaluable collection of documents 
dealing with Leon's imbroglio at Saint-Denis with 
the Colonel of the National Guard, — a comic inter- 
lude and diverting chapter in a life abounding in 
burlesque escapades ; to M. Joachim Klihn, whose 
laborious and ingenious researches have enabled 
me to follow the fortunes of Leon's mother and her 
third husband to the end ; to M. Pierre Bart, who, 
while M. Joachim Kiihn was pushing his inquiries 
in Germany, was pursuing similar investigations in 
France — investigations that culminated in some 
happy finds; to the MM. Saffroy, brothers, thanks 



PREFATORY NOTE 7 

to whom I am able to include several hitherto un- 
published letters ; in fact, to all the disinterested 
collaborators to whom belongs the credit of much 
that is new and curious in the book. 

H. F. 



CONTENTS 



rAGB 

Prefatory Note ...... 5 

List of Illustrations . . . . .11 



BOOK I 
AN EMPEROR'S CAPRICE 

CHAP. 

I. Story of a dashing Dragoon, of the tender 

Eléonore, and of a Singular Pair of 

Parents-in-Law . . . -15 

II. The Case for the Emperor . . -44 

III. Napoleon and Eléonore . . . -63 

IV. Return of the "Avenger of Virtue" . . 92 



BOOK II 

COUNT LEON'S TRAGI-COMIC HISTORY 

I. An Emperor's Son and a "Man ahout Town" . 147 
II. LÉON and the Napoleons . . . -171 

III. From Roguery to Mysticism, taking Politics 

v.v the way ..... 199 

IV. Deepening Shadows — Ii,i--Repute and Oblivion 224 



lo CONTENTS 



APPENDIX 

ADDITIONS AND SUPPLEMENTARY 
DOCUMENTS 

PAGE 

I. Rogue Revel the Moral Legatee of the 

Emperor . . . . .251 

II. Napoleon as a Father in Myth and Legend . 264 

Index ....... 283 



LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS 

Count Léon ..... Fro7itispiece 

From a Lithograph in the Collection of Emile Brouwet. 

FACING HAGE 

Éléonore Denuelle de la Plaigne . . .26 

From a Portrait by Philibekte Ledoux. 

Caroline Murat . . . . . .66 

From a Lithograph by HoPWOOD. 

Baron Claude-François de Meneval . . .82 

From a Miniature in the Possession of the de Menevai. family. 

The Emperor Napoleon . . . .110 

From a Picture by Delaroche. 

Count Lkon ...... 156 

From a rare Lithograph. 

Éléonore in 1838 ..... 166 

From a Miniature in the Author's collection. 

Baron de Meneval . . . . .198 

After a Lithograph by Auguste Bkv. 

Count Leon in Old Age . . . .242 



BOOK I 
AN EMPEROR'S CAPRICE 



t.i 



CHAPTER I 

STORY OF A DASHING DRAGOON, OF THE 
TENDER ÉLÉONORE, AND OF A SINGULAR 
PAIR OF PARENTS-IN-LAW 

Revel, his antecedents and character — Curious details of his 
military career — A chance meeting at the Théâtre de la 
Gaieté — A "Cleopatra of sixteen" — The family Denuelle 
de la Plaigne — An interesting group — A pupil of Mme 
Campan's " Pension," an establishment greatly favoured in 
high quarters — Polite education under the Consulate — 
Some of her pupils and their love affairs — Revel makes 
himself at home in the Denuelle household — A miraculous 
pocket-book — The dragoon a successful suitor — Son-in-law 
and mother-in-law — Money squabbles — Mme Campan to 
the rescue — The marriage contract signed — A singular 
honeymoon — Revel arrested — " Where is Éléonore ? " — 
Ask the Emperor ! 

Five feet nothing in height, "with a slim but well- 
knit figure and a very agreeable face," chestnut 
hair and eyebrows, a grey eye, an aquiline nose 
above a mouth of average proportions, and a 
round chin terminating an oval visage, — such is 
the description of a certain Jean-Honoré-François 
Revel, who was for cutting a dash at Paris in 
the Year xii. He was a regular frequenter of 
the places of amusement of the day, — Tivoli, where 



1 6 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

a nymph was carried up in the air hanging from 
the car of a balloon ; Frascati, where loving couples 
lost themselves in shady groves after the intoxica- 
tion of the "walse"; Garchi, famed for its ices ; 
the "Estaminet Hollandais," where, crop in hand and 
spurs on heel, the exquisite found it easy to per- 
suade the company he had just dismounted from 
a gallop in the Bois de Boulogne ; — haunts, one and 
all, crowded with idlers, light-hearted scamps, girls 
dressed in the latest, or all but the latest, fashions, 
"pigeons" and clever sharpers to pluck them. In 
suchlike resorts, it seems. Revel pursued fortune 
and the favour of the fair. A dashing fellow, he 
could boast the fascinating graces of a man of 
thirty and an imposing dragoon uniform — which, 
by the by, he had no right to wear, for since 
I Nivôse, Year xii, he had ceased to be on the 
active list. A native of the South, he still had 
all the fondness for fine clothes and bright colours 
characteristic of the Méridional, and added addi- 
tional touches out of his own head to the brilliancy of 
the military dress, of which he was all the prouder 
because he was not officially entitled to wear it. 

It was at Margins, in the Var, that the son 
of Jean Revel and Angélique-Charlotte Achard 
his wife, Jean- Honoré-François, was born Sep- 
tember II, 1773. His father was a "magistrate" 
— yes, but what sort of a magistrate ? Our gallant 
friend, who has a trick of telling tales it is hard to 



REVEL'S ANTECEDENTS 17 

verify, has neglected to supply any precise informa- 
tion on the point. He observes a like reticence 
concerning his marriage with a certain Mademoiselle 
Jeanne-Charlotte Ruzot, by whom he had a son and 
a daughter. He must have been still very young 
at the time, for he was barely twenty when he 
enlisted as a soldier, on March i, 1793, in the 
I St battalion of the Alpes-Maritimes. In after 
years, in July 18 10, inditing a Plainte à Fart de 
la gîierre we find him exclaiming — 

Je fat, par goût, au sortir de Venfance, 
Sur tous les arts donné la préférence, 
Issu d'un père, autrefois magistrat, 
Malgré son vœu, je me suis fait soldat.^ 

And he made a pretty good thing of it, to begin 
with. On June 24, 1793, he was appointed Lieu- 
tenant, and on 9 Ventôse, Year 11, Quartermaster. 
On 1 1 Floréal, Year in, he was raised to the 
grade of Quartermaster-Captain. He had made 
the campaign of 1793 with the Army of the 
Pyrénées-Orientales, and in Year iv he was ordered 
to join the Army of Italy. The mania for writing, 
by which he had been possessed from boyhood, 
led him at this period to indite a work on the 
administration of the military forces. Bonaparte, 

^ " I have, from choice, since childhood's days, over all the 
arts given thee preference ; born of a father, erstwhile a magis- 
trate, despite his wish, I have made myself a soldier " {Archives 
administratives du ministère de la guerre : dossier Revel). 



1 8 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

at that time General-in-Chief, read it, and invited 
him to his table. This military and culinary- 
triumph Revel has celebrated in verse : — 

D'un doux plaisir mon âme fut re?nplie 
Quand le héros vainqueur de PAusonie 
Me fit r honneur de lire un de ??ies plans 
Et d^ applaudir à mes jeunes talents?- 

These successes, however, were short-lived. 
As a result of the reorganization of the Year iv, 
Revel was retired as an officer on half-pay. 
Thereupon he returned to his native Department, 
vegetated there for a while, and eventually removed 
to the Saone-et- Loire, where he was appointed 
Secretary in chief under the Central Administra- 
tion of that Department. 

He must have been in low water ; it was a 
question now of his daily bread. Yet he found 
this hard to digest in civilian employment. Not- 
withstanding sundry infirmities contracted in the 
service, he cherished hopes of once more girding 
on the warrior's sword, and already, in the Year 
VII, we see him petitioning for his reinstallation in 
the army. The Commissioner of the Executive 
Directory in connexion with the Central Adminis- 
tration of the Saone-et-Loire recommended him, 
II Thermidor, Year vii, to the Minister of War 
for a post as commissariat officer. " He is a man 

^ " My soul was filled with agreeable pleasure when the 
victorious hero of Ausonia did me the honour to read one of my 
projects and to applaud my youthful talents." 



MILITARY CAREER 19 

of irreproachable integrity," he writes. Mark this 
recommendation and these words of encomium. 
We shall have more to say of the matter. How- 
ever, months go by and nothing happens. At last 
Revel's patience is exhausted, and one day, on 23 
Floréal, Year viii, he gives in his papers. He 
sets off for Paris, where he spends his time 
tramping from bureau to bureau and kicking his 
heels in ante-chambers. He contrives to secure 
the interest of an Inspector-General of Revisions, 
General-of-Division Gauthier, who, on 30 Germinal, 
Year viii, authorizes the Council of Administration 
of the 15th Regiment of Dragoons to accept Revel 
as Paymaster. At the same time a memorandum 
is appended, which reads : "If the Citoyen Revel 
fails in the sequel to justify the confidence of the 
Council of Administration, the latter is hereby 
authorized to make another selection." The pro- 
viso is not for nothing, and we may well ask what 
breath of suspicion dictated it ; for in Vendémiaire, 
Year x, Revel, being still Paymaster in the 15th 
Regiment of Dragoons — the Dragoons of Egypt — 
it is proposed to retire him on the ground that "the 
conduct of the Citoyen Revel has given rise to 
notable complaints, and his citation before a court- 
martial, where he appears to be still under examina- 
tion, precludes an immediate decision in his case." 
What was the issue ? Was Revel acquitted ? 
Was influence made on his behalf.'* These points 



20 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

remain obscure. All I can learn for certain is, that 
some months subsequently, on 25 Messidor, Year 
XII, General Canclaux reported in a memorandum 
to the Inspectors of Revisions : — 

" A very able and very clever officer, but 
strongly suspected from the point of view of 
integrity ; cannot remain in the regiment inasmuch 
as he is only there as supernumerary, but still more 
on the grounds that he does nothing but intrigue. 
Has been, however, indispensable hitherto for 
straightening out the accounts of the complementary 
squadron. Having no means of livelihood or of 
supporting his family, has some claims on the 
Government's compassion, if not on its sense of 
justice." 

Perhaps I am deceiving myself, but I am bound 
to say the tone of all these memoranda seems 
anything but flattering to Revel. We shall have 
an opportunity of examining the point later on. 
As for the accounts of the squadron referred to, 
these were in fact extremely involved and led to 
the suicide of the individual responsible for them. 
Occasion for another stave from Revel : — 

An regiment le désordre régnait, 

Pour rendre compte un comptable se tue ; 

Cette aventure à Versailles confiue 

Ne rend que moi victime du forfait.^ 

1 " In the regiment disorder reigned supreme; to square his 
accounts, an accountant officer kills himself. This misadventure 
reported at Versailles only renders me victim of the default" 



A DUBIOUS RECORD 21 

As a matter of fact this date marks the removal 
of his name to the retired Hsts. But, being clever 
at straightening out figures and balancing involved 
accounts, he found an opportunity of utilizing his 
talents and industry in this direction. General 
Davrange d'Haugeran ville engaged his services 
in this capacity provisionally, and Revel came 
to Paris, where he took up his abode in the 
Rue du Faubourg-Saint-Honoré, No. 8. Such 
was his situation when one evening in the Year xii 
a chance meeting occurred that was destined to 
involve the most unexpected consequences for his 
future life. 

For some years now the Quartermaster had 
been a widower. His wife, it appears, had died of 
despair ; I conjecture that the not over-scrupulous 
ways of her husband had a good deal to do 
with it. Be this as it may, the widower was 
now seeking consolation and anxious to marry 
again, " my worldly interests," he declared, 
" necessitatinor a second marriaf^e." So far, so 
good. Well, on this particular evening Revel, 
being at a loss for amusement, went to spend 
an hour or two at the Theatre de la Gaieté. 
Standing on the Boulevard du Temple, the 
house had formerly sheltered the King's "Grands 

{Plainte à l'art de la guerre, par Revel, capitaine au 61° 
régiment de ligne. Worms, July 28, 18 10. — Archives adminis- 
tratives du niinistcre de la guerre : dossier Revel). 



22 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

Danseurs," still known as the "spectacle du 
Sieur Nicolet," and had once been the scene 
of the brilliant triumphs of the Demoiselle Sophie 
Forest, whom Bertin, treasurer of the privy 
purse, had established with a houseful of furniture 
worth 60,000 francs in the Rue Popincourt-au- 
Pont-aux-Choux, the same who was so outrage- 
ously vilified in a certain foul-mouthed pamphlet 
of the revolutionary time/ It was to the 
manager of this house that the Citoyen Eve, 
known as Maillot, had surrendered the rights 
oi Madame Angot ou la poissarde parvenue, which, 
bought of the author for 500 francs, had filled the 
manager's pockets to the tune of 500,000. Since 
then its pieces had been less spicy. There had 
been Ortalban, a melodrama in three acts, by 
Pesay ; Alquif ott la valeur récompensée, a panto- 
mime which, "thanks to the property man," 
achieved " a certain success " ; the Jttgement de 
Mon-Salo, " a monstrous dirty production," by 
Vilieu and Bouel ; Les Fous Hollandais ; Elisa 
ou le triomphe des femmes, and other sparkling 
trivialities of the sort. A certain Monsieur 
Mayeur, otherwise called Saint-Paul, author of 
an obscene libel against Marie Antoinette, actor 
and author, was manager of the house, which 
was built in 1760, and on whose stage Martainville 

^ Les Pantins des boulevards ou bordels de Thalle . . . Paris, 
1791, 8vo. 



AT THE PLAY 23 

was in 1806 to produce his famous and never-to-be- 
forgotten Pied de Mouton} 

On the evening in question some insipid piece 
of the kind typical of the place was billed. 
Revel had settled himself in the balcony to enjoy 
the play. From there he perceived that an 
adjoining- box was occupied by persons who 
appeared to merit his attention. There was, 
to begin with, a lady of a certain age who 
struck him as possessing grace, amiability, polite- 
ness, and — a subsequent discovery — wit. She was 
no niggard in displaying the charms of her fine 
person, possibly because she had read the First 
Book of Ovid's Ars Amoris, in which certain 
women are spoken of who "go to the play to see, 
but likewise to be seen themselves." By this lady's 
side sat a "Cleopatra of sixteen," having "the 
figure of Flora, great dark eyes, a complexion like 
the lily, cheeks like the rose," "tall, slender, 
graceful, a brunette, vivacious and coquettish to 
a degree." An individual of the male sex, much 
like anybody else, together with a little girl, com- 
pleted the group filling the box. Revel was 
fascinated. Providentially, between the acts, he 
came upon a friend who was acquainted with 

^ Pulled down in 1808, burned down in 1835, the Théâtre de 
la Gaieté was rebuilt the same year. It disappeared eventually 
in the transformations and demolitions of the Boulevard du 
Temple. — Nicolas Brozier, Chronique des petits théâtres de Paris. 
Paris, 18S3. 



24 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

these agreeable persons. Revel leaped at the 
chance, and, there and then, was presented to 
the occupants of the box. The ladies were 
alone, the gentleman having gone for a stroll up 
and down the corridors. The newcomer proved 
himself a brilliant and fascinating cavalier. The 
ladies were unable to retain their admiration, and 
soon, the dragoon admits, " I found I had a 
difficult part to play between these two divinities." 
Fortunately the male member of the party now 
appeared to save him from his delicate predicament. 
He brought back with him the little girl, — Zulma 
she was called, — who soon perched in the friendliest 
way on Revel's knee. " I was caught, constrained, 
conquered by the charms of a fascinating picture." 
Sweet intimacy, delicious spectacle : father, 
mother, daughter, little girl sitting on the dragoon's 
lap ! He seemed one of the family already. He 
talked freely, he says so himself, — he waxed 
confidential. He owned to being in the army. 
Ah, ha ! Monsieur is a soldier ? No doubt, no 
doubt, but some little while since he had retired 
from active service, to devote his energies to 
business. Business ! — the word had an attractive 
ring and promised well ! What sort of business ? 
" I was going," he told them, "to be at the head' 
of an important enterprise established on a far- 
reaching plan which I had brought to the favour- 
able notice of a body of wealthy capitalists, its 



A ''CLEOPATRA OF SIXTEEN" 25 

object being the supply of all kinds of necessaries 
to the troops." 

Confidence for confidence, the father of this 
simple family then gave his name — Dominique 
Denuelle de la Plaic^ne. He was ena-a<jed in 
"speculation." What speculations? A delicate 
question to answer! In plain truth, let us out 
with it al once, this man Denuelle, who was an 
associate of the notorious Pilâtre des Rosiers 
and had no right to the name of La Plaigne, was 
not a "gentleman of means," as represented, but 
rather a "speculator, in the grand style of course," 
— a style which had actually led him to the 
Conciergerie, where he had once upon a time been 
confined. As for his wife, Françoise-Caroline- 
Eléonore Couprie, she was an undesirable whose 
pretty trade it will be our business to examine into 
later on. In a word, these Denuelles were not 
quiet people who had been fortunate in their 
business dealings, but pleasant-mannered scoundrels, 
common cheats and tricksters. Amongst them their 
elder daughter, Louise-Catherine-Ëléonore, stood 
out in pleasant contrast. " Cleopatra " was born 
on September 13, 1787, in the parish of Saint- 
Eustache. A portrait of her, by Philiberte Ledoux, 
shows her a melancholy-eyed, rather languishing 
figure, wearing a white frock set off with a mauve 
riband and a belt of old sfold and holdinsj a letter 
inscribed with the words : " Yes, I shall love thee 



26 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

for ever. ..." This was indeed pretty much the 
fond wish that filled Revel's heart that evening, 
dazzled as he was by the nymph's charms. How 
ravishing, how lovable, how sweet and tender she 
was ! He was yet more stirred, yet more trans- 
ported by the perfections of her beauty, when, in a 
discreet undertone, the mother informed him how 
the delectable Êléonore was still at boarding-school 
with Mme Campan and was enjoying a short 
holiday for the moment. Mme Campan, protégée 
of the First Consul, a schoolmistress who was half 
a government official, who was training Bonaparte's 
own sisters in the way they should go ! Revel was 
struck dumb, and there and then fell in love with 
the fair Êléonore. A pupil at Mme Campan's ! 
A pupil at that nursery of the old-world Aristocracy ! 
The deuce ! What were these Denuelles de la 
Plaigne then? Revel "pondered these things in 
his heart." 

At that date the mere name of Mme Campan 
was a guarantee of high distinction, a patent of 
nobility. Born in Paris on October 6, 1752, the 
daughter of Genet, Head Clerk at the Ministry of 
Foreign Affairs, she had begun her career and found 
means to educate herself in the post of first Maid- 
in- Waiting and Reader to Marie Antoinette, whose 
household she entered in 1 774. Married on May 1 1, 
1774, at Versailles, to François-Bertholet Campan, 
Master of the Wardrobe to the Comtesse d'Artois, 




Er.KOXORE DENUEI.I.E DK I. a I'lAlGNE 
Kioni a rorlrait bv riiiMBi.Krn; Ledoux. 



MADAME CAMPAN 27 

she had obtained on June 4, 1790, a decree of 
judicial separation from the Court of the Chàtelet 
at Paris, and on August 10, 1792, early in the 
Revolution, had quitted the Queen's service. Dur- 
ing the Terror she lay concealed at Coubertin, 
in the Valley of Chevreuse, with her nieces, one of 
whom was afterwards to be the wife of Marshal 
Ney. Soon after the 9 Thermidor, with nothing 
but an assig7tat of 400 francs in her pocket, she 
opened, in the Rue de Poissy at Saint-Germain 
(a nun of the Order of St. Thomas of Villeneuve 
helping her in the enterprise), a boarding-school 
that won a rapid and brilliant success. The old 
noble families entrusted their daughters to her 
care ; one who had been Maid-in-Waiting to the 
Queen could not fail to command their confidence. 
The next step, the old premises proving too 
cramped, was to lease, 6 Prairial, Year iii, the 
erstwhile Hôtel de Rohan in the Rue de l'Unité, 
on which she bestowed the title of Institution 
Nationale de Saint-Germain. In Fructidor fol- 
lowing the Vicomtesse de Beauharnais sent her 
daughter Hortense to the school. The Consulate 
came in due course, and the fortune of the school 
was made ! Amongst its pupils were Stéphanie 
Tascher de la Pagerie, the Princesse d'Arenberg 
to be ; Charlotte Bonaparte, daughter of Lucien ; 
Annette Murat, who became Princess Hohen- 
zollern ; Clotilde ]\Iurat, subsequently Duchesse 



2 8 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

de Corrigliano ; Eugénie Hulot, soon to marry 
Marshal Moreau ; Adèle Mac Donald, who will 
become Duchesse de Massa; Aimée Leclerc, Nièves 
Hervas, Félicité de Faudoas, Sophie de Marbois, 
Victorine Masséna, presently to be wives of Dukes 
and Marshals of France — Eckmuhl, Friuli, Rovigo, 
Piacenza. Caroline, who will wear the crown of 
Naples ; Pauline, who will be Princess Borghèse ; 
Hortense, Queen of Holland, had been at the 
school. " I found myself in charge of a young 
brood of kings and queens, without ever suspecting 
it," Mme Campan used to say at a later date. " I 
must own it was very fortunate for us all that we 
knew nothing about it. Their education was just 
the same as that of the other girls." To tell truth, 
this education was mainly devoted to the arts of 
pleasing and the inculcation of a refined and tactful 
charity such as befits little girls who will one day 
grow into great ladies.^ They were taught to 
dance prettily, to curtsy graciously, to twang the 
harp, to play the harpsichord, to sing and draw, 
to make music and paint, — and occasionally, by 
way of recreation, to visit the poor of Saint- 

1 " The young ladies at Mme Campan's school had clubbed 
together to make her a present on her birthday, and had a sum 
of 30 louis to dispose of. When the day came, they decided, 
after consultation, that the most agreeable offering they could 
make their mistress would be to devote the amount collected to 
an act of charity. Accordingly, they handed the sum in question 
to the curé of Saint-Germain, begging him to make use of it in 



A BROOD OF QUEENS 29 

Germain. "It does not appear that morals formed 
the object of any special care in the curriculum of 
education Mme Campan followed with her brilliant 
pupils," writes one author.^ The fact is sufficiently 
proved by what we know of the private life of 
some of these, — Hortense, for instance, notorious 
for her sentimental divagations ; Pauline, renowned 
for her wild doings ; Caroline, at one and the same 
time Junot's mistress and Metternich's ; Mile de 
Faudoas, Duchesse de Rovigo, famed for her 
amours with Sébastiani ; Mlle Mac Donald, who 
used to be always saying : " Je m'en moque ! " and 
who, in answer to the remonstrances addressed to 
her, replied: "Very well! I shan't say 'Je m'en 
moque!' (I don't care a hang!) any more; I shall 
say, 'Je m'en fous!'" (I don't care a damn!). 
Not to mention Eléonore herself. . . . But this is 
to anticipate ; for the present, as he gazed at her, 
Revel thought only of the guarantee Mme Campan's 
name afforded of wealth and assured position on 
the part of parents. If he had only known that 
he7' parents at that moment owed two years' school 

the coming year, at the time of the first communion, for the 
benefit of two young girls, the poorest in the parish, who should 
have signalized themselves by their regular attendance at cate- 
chism, by the way they had profited by the lessons given them, 
and by the love and respect they had shown their parents." — 
Gazette de France, 3 Thermidor, An xii (July 22, 1S04). — A. 
Aulard, Paris sous le premier empire. Paris, 19 12. 

^ Joseph Turquan, Souveraines et grandes dames, etc., Paris, 
1896, 8vo, pp. 42, 43. 



30 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

fees to Mme Campan, who was " kicking up a 
fine shindy " ! But he was still in blissful ignor- 
ance, — which was the worse for him, for he 
deliberately embarked on an adventure that was 
to cost him precious dear. But to return to our 
tale. 

In the box, Revel's grand talk and his boasts 
about the vast enterprises he was planning had 
evidently dazzled his new friends. It seems these 
sharpers were on the look-out for a victim, just as 
Revel was himself. Fate brought them tog-ether. 
An interesting study, to watch the two parties, 
equally impecunious, attacking each other's purse. 
Well, Revel was invited to visit them at home, at 
No. 340 Boulevard des Italiens, where the household 
was settled for the time being. The dragoon 
rubbed his hands, radiant with delight. Indeed he 
says himself that it was "with something like 
pleasure he learned " from the friend who had 
introduced him to the Denuelles " that Eleonore 
would have no dower save her person and her 
talents," albeit this is hardly consistent with the 
statement we saw him making a few pages back to 
the effect that "his worldly interests necessitated 
a second marriage." Apparently, Éléonore's poverty 
was no detriment to his "worldly interests." We 
shall see. Next day he hastened to keep his 
engagement in the happiest of moods. The 
Denuelles' home did not greatly impress him. He 



A PROPOSAL OF MARRIAGE 31 

noticed that the drawinor-room was hunor with 

o o 

Éléonore's crayons. I have mentioned that Mme 
Campan's young ladies were taught the use of the 
chalks. The Denuelles were expecting him. By 
some means, I know not what, he led them to 
believe he had a pocket-book with over 100,000 
francs' worth of securities in it ; any way, the fact 
remains they ivcre persuaded of the fact, and Mme 
Denuelle displayed the greatest amiability towards 
her guest. He utilized this advantage to push his 
attack on Êléonore. He paid her a string of insipid 
compliments which she took in very good part, till 
finally her face was "suffused with a maidenly 
blush " when he blurted out his proposal. She 
bade him moreover apply to her parents if he would 
have her hand, which Revel swore he was burning 
to possess. Evidently, the gallant soldier was 
carrying things with a high hand. Pending further 
negotiations, Êléonore invited him to admire the 
pictures on the walls. The rascal admits that "the 
living masterpiece at my side absorbed far more of 
my attention than did the criticism of her studies." 
However, the hour of parting was come. As he 
made his adieux, Eléonore looked chagrined. For 
his own part, " I left the house enchanted," Revel 
tells us. He flattered himself the affair was well in 
hand and the orirl as Qrood as won. 

Next day our bold dragoon returned to the 
charge. The word marriage was discreetly pro- 



32 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

nounced. By general request he read aloud to the 
company the outline of his plan for supplying 
miscellaneous necessaries to the troops. Mme 
Denuelle was fascinated, while her husband assured 
the author of this admirable project in so many 
words that to secure its success he must have 
a wife. It was Jean- Honoré- François' turn to 
find his cheeks "suffused with a maidenly blush." 
Eléonore was sent out of the room, a "family 
council " was convened, and Revel, rising to the 
occasion, formally demanded the lady's hand. 
His suit was favourably received and he was 
authorized to "pay his attentions" to the tender 
Eléonore during what was left of her holidays ; to 
end up, he was asked to stay dinner. He was in 
the seventh heaven. " The repast was delicious," 
but the evening that ensued was far more so, for 
Revel could woo the object of his passion at his 
ease. Then began a fortnight of Paradise ; dinners, 
walks, visits to the play, tender interviews filled the 
days. At last Eléonore had to go back to Saint- 
Germain. How touching the farewells ! " Eléonore 
renewed her first fond oaths, and I pledged myself 
never to belong to any other woman." So Paul 
and Virginie exchanged their vows on the happy 
shores of the île de France. 

His mistress is gone, but Revel is no less 
assiduous in his visits to the flat in the Boulevard 
des Italiens. Already he was so much the "tame 



THE MAGIC POCKET-BOOK 33 

cat " that the couple would quarrel at table in 
his presence, saying " the cruellest and coarsest 
things" to one another. The prospective son- 
in-law tried, with the best intentions, to act as 
peacemaker. The future mother-in-law told him to 
mind his own business, — presumably the supply of 
miscellaneous necessaries to the troops. But, in 
a discreet undertone, as they rose from table, the 
father-in-law let him know that shortness of cash 
was the real ground of quarrel, on the well-known 
principle that, when the manger is empty, the horses 
begin to fight. In such a case what is a good son- 
in-law to do ? Unfasten his purse-strings of course. 
So Revel unfastened his famous pocket-book with 
the 100,000 francs. He tells the story with dignity, 
but I imagine, if the facts are as he says, he must 
have regarded the transaction with a rather less 
magnanimous and philosophical resignation. His 
eyes must have been still further opened when 
presently he learned from Lucille, Mme Denuelle's 
maid, that the scene had been all a got-up thing, 
arranged beforehand in every particular. Heavens ! 
The same farce, it seemed, had been played before 
for the benefit of divers other aspirants, who had 
been instantly shown the door the day when they 
had refused to be bled or when their generosity had 
run dry. But Revel's heart was in the right place. 
He loved the daughter and showed himself magnan- 
imous to the parents, — and paid up. 



34 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

Nevertheless a day came when expenses rose to 
such a height that Revel grew anxious about the 
fate of his pocket-book and its valuable contents. 
Diffidently he put the question, — When was the 
wedding day to be ? He was answered with vague 
promises ; procrastination was the order of the day. 
" Friends of M. Revel's assert that he used at one 
time to give as another motive for these delays the 
too ardent friendship, at any rate the too lively 
esteem, with which he had inspired his future mother- 
in-law." But the dragoon was deaf of that ear. 
Hang the mother ! it was the daughter he wanted. 
And lo ! one fine day he took the high hand. At 
that, Mme Denuelle, without more ado, declared 
roundly she would never give her consent to the 
marriage. Revel started up, gripped Denuelle by 
the collar, dragged him into his closet, and demanded 
back his 4000 francs advanced to pay household 
expenses. Denuelle treated the thing as a joke, 
but his wife followed them into the room and 
informed the dragoon that if their company was 
not to his taste, there was nothing to stop him 
walking out of the door. The insult was past 
bearing and put the soldier on his mettle. " I 
repaid the impertinence with a look of scorn and 
left the house without another word." He ran to 
ask advice of General Davrange d'Haugeranville, 
who employed him as secretary and amanuensis, 
and the General recommended him to consult Mme 



A DRAGON OF VIRTUE 35 

Campan. To that worthy lady the dragoon was 
not entirely an unknown quantity. Letters from 
Mme Denuelle had described him for her benefit 
as a licentious, jealous, ill-tempered, conceited man. 
For all this. Revel went to see her, and having a 
ready tongue and a dashing manner, he succeeded 
in removing her prejudices. A few well-turned 
compliments enlisted her on his side, — not a difficult 
achievement, for it is notorious that Mme Campan 
"loved flattery, which did not even require to be 
dressed in refined phraseology to gratify her." 

Refined or no, Revel made a favourable im- 
pression on the lady in question, who proved it 
there and then by confiding her secret thoughts to 
him. The dragoon having exposed his sorrows 
and disappointments and enlarged on the atrocious 
behaviour of Mme Denuelle, she delivered herself 
to this effect : "I am convinced Mme La Plaigne 
means to sell poor Êléonore and make me blush 
for having ever admitted her among my pupils. 
I have made up my mind to invoke the interest of 
the grandees of the Empire in her lot. She has 
been playmate with all the Princesses of the 
Imperial dynasty ; over them, over their husbands, 
and even over the Emperor, I have, I will not 
say unlimited credit, but certainly great inlluence, 
and in Mme de La Plaigne's despite I will secure 
the happiness of a child who merits all my solici- 
tude." Revel could not contain himself for joy. 



36 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

Mme Campan concluded ; " Prince Murat has 
already done something to secure Éléonore's 
position, and manifests an inclination to contribute 
to her fortune ; but we must get her married first, 
that is the main point. You have done well to 
seek her hand. I can see you are a man of spirit, 
and if to this gift of nature you add judiciousness, 
tact, if, above all, you can trust your wife's virtue, 
— and she- deserves your trust, — as my husband 
did mine, though he saw me surrounded by snares 
which youth and beauty seldom escape at Court, 
you will find yourself loaded with riches and 
honours." Riches? . . . Honours! . . . H'm! 
Revel failed quite to grasp the connexion of these 
effects with their cause ; but there, as Mme Campan 
stood guarantee for this miraculous future ! ... . He 
agreed blindly to all she said, adopted her point of 
view and took his departure, carrying off with him 
the warmest assurances of Mme Campan's co-opera- 
tion in his championship of the fair Éléonore. 

Nor did she fail him, for the very next day after 
his visit, Mme Denuelle having arrived at Saint- 
Germain to remove her daughter from the school, 
Mme Campan flatly refused to let her go, and the 
"female Orestes" retreated, uttering cries of rage. 
But meantime the wolf was still howling at the 
door in the Boulevard des Italiens. . . . Revel had 
100,000 francs in his magic pocket-book. . . . The 
Denuelles ate humble pie and implored the injured 



WEDDING 37 

dracfoon to fors^ive and fororet. He aofreed, but on 
condition that the marriage contract was immedi- 
ately drawn up. So, in presence of Maître 
L'Alleman, Notary, it was duly executed on 
6 Nivôse, An xiii, and Mme Campan, Mile Tascher 
de la Pagerie, Stéphanie de Beauharnais, did this 
gang of rogues the honour of signing it. By this 
document Revel assigned to Êléonore the sum of 
50,000 francs, — the half of what his pocket-book 
contained ; in addition, he promised her " a rich 
trousseau," and at Saint-Germain he was to make 
her acquainted with the children of his first 
marriage. Preparations for the wedding were 
instantly put in hand. On 25 Nivôse, An xiii 
(January 15, 1S05), ^^e ceremony took place at 
Saint-Germain before the Deputy Mayor, Jean- 
Louis Mary. Revel was accompanied by two " wit- 
nesses " in imposing uniforms, — Claude-Hippolyte 
Preval, Colonel of the 3rd Regiment of Cuirassiers 
in garrison at Saint-Germain, and Louis-Joseph 
Sanctuari, Lieutenant-Colonel in the same regiment. 
He brought with him, besides, a retired military 
man, Paul-Charles-Marie Saint- Paul, resident at 
Paris, No. 14 Rue du Hasard. Supporting the 
bride were Jean-Baptiste-Bruno Francey, of No. 10 
Rue des Petits-Augustins, and Carette, merchant, 
doing business in the Rue d'Orléans, district of 
the Marais. All these fine folks were present at 
the banquet provided at Revel's expense by the 



38 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

innkeeper Sorel ; it came to 2000 francs, we are 
told, from which it may be gathered that the viands 
were varied and abundant. Mme Denuelle enjoyed 
the honour of being seated beside the Colonel of 
Cuirassiers. Possibly this was by way of a trick 
that Revel, knowing the inflammable stuff his 
mother-in-law was made of, was for playing off on 
the Colonel. Perhaps he may be forgiven, if we 
consider the sort of change in which Mme Denuelle 
paid him back on this account and on others, for, 
as we saw, long before the marriage son-in-law and 
mother-in-law were on terms of anything but family 
accord. 

In my story of this singular marriage I have 
followed the account of it which Revel himself has 
thought fit to make public. I have left him, pro- 
visionally, to be responsible for the absurdities and 
improbabilities he has crammed it with, and I will 
maintain the sam.e attitude throughout the episode. 
As there is only his evidence to appeal to, I am 
forced to compile my narrative from this source ; 
but I shall assume the right, at the end of it all, 
to pronounce how much can reasonably be believed. 
I shall take that opportunity to examine and expose, 
once for all, the fables and falsehoods of this 
fantastic tale, so as to obviate any necessity for 
reverting to the subject later on in the book. The 
ground I have to work on must be cleared of dross ; 
and this clearance had best be effected at the 



HONEYMOON 39 

beginning. For the moment, I continue to follow 
Revel as guide in the recital of his amazing 
adventure and the fond dream, soon interrupted, of 
the honeymoon he had so hardly earned. 

Happily married, Revel proceeded to enshrine 
his jewel in a setting of dazzling splendour. He 
began by hiring a carriage by the month from 
Sorel's brother-in-law — the innkeeper Sorel who had 
supplied his wedding banquet at Saint-Germain, 
Next he thought about a permanent home. He 
rented a house in Paris, in the Rue des Moulins, 
and dreamed of magrnificent furnishings and decora- 
tions to tickle the taste of his Clorinda. Pending 
the completion of these arrangements, the happy 
pair left Saint-Germain, where a temporary home 
had been installed, and went to lodge in the Rue 
de la Révolution, at the Hôtel Britannique. The 
epoch of " Love's young dream " opened ; Revel 
was entranced, enchanted ! Aided by a maid, 
who was the daughter of Mme Campan's porter, 
Êléonore, bright, gay, vivacious, was a vision of 
beauty as she moved about the hired apartments. 
Wedded bliss enfolded the dragoon, that shrewd 
man of accounts, in its embrace. And presently 
Elconore, mindful of the accomplishments learned 
at Saint-Germain, undertook to draw her husband's 
portrait. He posed for her, — another scene of 
tender sensibility ! This went on well and happily 
for some days ; then a strange thing happened. 



40 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

Eléonore's cheerfulness waned, disappeared. She 
left her chalks untouched, the portrait unfinished. 
Her melancholy grew unmistakable. Indifference 
checked the amorous transports of Jean- Honoré- 
François, who exhausted himself in repeating — only 
in prose — Hippolyte's question to Aricie — 

Quand je suis tout de feu, d'où vous vient cette glace?- 

He could make nothing of her. But, lo ! one 

day he came upon her writing a letter, which she 

threw in the fire as he came in. Oh, ho ! Revel 

noticed that Éléonore was going back inordinately 

often to see Mme Campan at Saint-Germain. " My 

pupils," that lady has left it on record, " were my 

daughters for all the time they were with me, and 

my friends when they had returned to their parents." 

Yes, but why did Éléonore always come back from 

Mme Campan's with a face "all on fire"? Revel 

asked himself the question. And now he came to 

think of it, the maid wore a mighty air of mystery. 

She was a creature too of Mme Campan's, for was 

she not the daughter of that lady's house-porter ? 

Everything about his home breathed suspicion. 

The dragoon sternly resolved to penetrate the 

mystery, and demanded an explanation point-blank. 

He blustered about his love and, which showed less 

tact, about the sacrifices he had made. Éléonore, 

choking with indignation, made no bones about the 

1 " When I am all fire, whence comes it you are ice ? " 



ARRESTED 41 

matter, picked up her chalks, packed up her belong- 
ings, and off to Saint-Germain. Then, with a very- 
grave face, Revel folded his arms and asked himself: 
" What is o^oinor on ? Can she be unfaithful ? " 

However, it was only a passing cloud. Olive- 
branch in hand, Mme Campan appeared, preached 
reconciliation, brought back the offended wife, and 
re-established peace and quietness. 

But there was something odd about things 
still. Êlconore's nightly slumbers were broken and 
feverish. "She was always heaving woeful sighs." 
Revel's mind was distressed and puzzled. A 
singular state of affairs after two months of married 
life. 

But worse was to follow. " The sixty-second 
day of this union became its tomb." On 26 Ventôse, 
Year xiii, at early dawn, a knock came at Revel's 
bedroom door at the Hôtel Britannique. When 
this was opened, there appeared in the aperture the 
Citoyen Chazot, Commissary of Police of the Section 
of the Tuileries, who had come from the Police 
depot in the Rue de Malte, No. 382, escorted by 
two henchmen. These sinister-looking individuals 
pushed their way into the room without one word 
of apology, turned the furniture topsy-turvy, ran- 
sacked the drawers, impounded the papers, while 
the Citoyen Chazot exhibited an ill-omened docu- 
ment ordering, in the name of His Majesty the 
Emperor, the summary arrest of the individual there- 



42 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

in named, Jean-Honoré-François Revel. It was a 
thunder-clap. There was no time for farewells. . . . 
To Êléonore's stupefaction, her husband was torn 
from her side and hustled into a hackney-coach 
which a little quick-stepping nag whisked off through 
the chilly morning air to the Prefecture of Police. 
Arrived there, our dashing dragoon was promptly 
put under lock and key. 

What was the chargée asfainst him ? He had 
ample leisure to ask himself the question during the 
next day or two. Eventually he was brought before 
a functionary, who, without any beating about the 
bush, informed him that he was accused of forgery 
in connexion with certain commercial documents. 
The facts were simple enough. To the order of 
Sorel, the innkeeper at Saint-Germain, and to cover 
the expenses of the wedding banquet and sundry 
other treats partaken of " with the guzzling La 
Plaigne and his dainty-loving better half," Revel 
had given a note-of-hand, backed by a certain La 
Feuille, Quartermaster of the loth Reoiment of 
Light Infantry. This man La Feuille, it seems, had 
employed Revel to reduce his accounts to order, and 
there is no doubt mutual financial services had been 
exchanged between the two. Sorel had promised 
not to put the bill in circulation ; but in spite of 
this, on its falling due, it had been presented for 
payment to La Feuille, who had declared his accept- 
ance to be a forgery. A complaint had been lodged, 



AN AMAZING DISCOVERY 43 

and Revel's arrest had followed. The dragoon 
found himself in for a charge of felony. 

So much he learned — if he did not know it 
before — on the occasion of his first examination. 
When this was completed, his mother-in-law was 
admitted to see him. " A ferocious triumph 
gleamed in her eyes." Her son-in-law under lock 
and key ! Revenge is sweet ! Boiling with indig- 
nation, Revel asked to be led back to his cell. But 
Mme Denuelle tracked him down even there, — 
which she found no difficulty in doing, being on 
intimate terms with a judge of the Criminal Court. 
Her object was to advise the jailer not to supply 
Revel with anything on credit. The turnkey, it 
appears, was "shocked at such barbarity." The 
mother-in-law was followed by Êléonore's aunt. 
She had come to counsel Revel to be submissive 
and resigned to his fate, and so parry the blows 
that threatened his devoted head. The dragoon 
only groaned and asked her, "Where, where is 
Êléonore ? " He soon found out from two friends 
who came to visit him. "It was impossible for me 
to doubt the truth any longer." Eléonore shared 
the Emperor's bed ! 



CHAPTER II 
THE CASE FOR THE EMPEROR 

Is Napoleon to be held guilty of Revel's misfortunes? — The 
evidence examined — The forgery and its consequences — 
Revel tried before the Criminal Court of Versailles — His 
counsel, M. Lebon — Revel as a poet — Sentenced — 
Caroline and Murat intervene in Revel's favour — Docu- 
ments bearing on the case — Problem of the promissory 
note ; a dilemma — A summing up — Revel's " dossier " at 
the Ministry of War as bad as can be — After sentence 
— Imprisonment at Dourdan — Fate of Eleonore — Divorce 
proceedings — Motives and justification — The Matrimojii- 
manie impounded — Revel released. 

The Emperor, then, had taken Eleonore for mistress, 
and it was to secure the peaceful and unchallenged 
enjoyment of her favours that he "devoted me to 
infamy," so Revel declares. Was this true? The 
question is a momentous one, and demands careful 
examination, and with other evidence than that 
supplied by the dragoon. Was the Emperor guilty 
of this crime, this outrage on the, personal liberty of 
a humble citizen ? Did concupiscence drive him to 
sully his glory by so tyrannical an abuse of power } 
It is no mere libel by a vulgar pamphleteer we are 
here concerned with ; the case is serious enough on 



A CHARGE OF FORGERY 45 

the face of it to merit a full and detailed scrutiny. 
Such an examination it here receives for the first 
time — an examination, if not complete, at any rate 
painstaking. It is important to discover if the 
Emperor is to be pronounced guilty ; for, once that 
is proven, Napoleon's amorous idiosyncrasy assumes 
a special character, if. to satisfy a lleshly caprice, he 
was capable of trampling under foot those laws of 
morality and justice of which he was the champion 
and restorer in a country just emancipated from the 
Terror. Hitherto Revel has been the only pleader 
to argue the case at the bar of posterity ; to-day I 
constitute myself Napoleon's advocate. 

To begin with, I pick up the thread of the 
story on the day after the arrest of Éléonore's hus- 
band. Directly the facts came to Denuelle's know- 
ledge, he hurried off with his daughter to Êvreux, 
where La Feuille lived, with the result that the 
Quartermaster undertook to admit the genuineness 
of his signature on Sorel's note of hand. As for 
the latter, interviewed ~by father and daughter on 
their way back from Evreux, iie consented to 
stop proceedings. The prosecution, therefore, had 
abandoned the case. But the plaint had been lodged, 
and the law took its course ; it was too late to stop 
proceedings. The hearing began. It involved 
graver issues in those days, under the law of 23 
Floréal, Year x, than attach to a case of the kind 
nowadays. The penalties for forgery were severe , 



46 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

and were exacted with exceptional rigour. This 
explains how it was that, in spite of La Feuille's 
and Sorel's withdrawal, the affair still went on. 
The Criminal Court of Paris, originally entrusted 
with the case, declared itself incompetent to deal 
with it, and in view of the place and date of the 
drawing of the bill, referred the matter to the 
Criminal Court of the Seine-et-Oise. Revel ac- 
cordingly was removed to Versailles. The counsel 
he selected was a certain Maître Lebon, a protégé 
of Mme Campan's. Mile Lebon, in fact, had 
married an avoué of the Tribunal of First Instance 
of the Seine-et-Oise, a M. Masson,^ through the 
good offices of Éléonore's erstwhile school-mistress, 
"that zealous apostle of the propagation of the 
species," as Revel calls her with biting sarcasm. 
This is a point to be noted among the intricacies 
of what has been characterized as a "boudoir 
intrigue." It was on 24 Thermidor, Year xiii, 
that Revel appeared before the Criminal Court of 

1 Evidently this is the same M. Masson to whom the follow- 
ing mention refers : " M. Masson, advocate pleading before the 
Tribunal of First Instance of Rambouillet, has addressed to 
Monseigneur the Chancellor of France a letter whereto he appends 
an offering of 300 francs. ' My wish,' he writes, ' is that this 
sum form a contribution to the prize for the first act of valour 
that shall be performed in this campaign by a soldier of the 
Armies of the Rhine ; let others make similar offerings for the 
second, third, and so on acts of valour, and the soldier, as a 
loyal citizen, will see to it there are many of them.' " — Journal 
general de France, samedi, 18 mars, 181 5. 



TRIAL 47 

Versailles. The Procureur-Général Giraudet prose- 
cuted. After the fall of the Empire, Revel declared 
himself dissatisfied with the way he had been de- 
fended by his counsel. " M. Lebon's pleadings 
were marked," he said, "by little save emphatic 
(sic) compliments to the Procureur - General and 
some oratorical outbursts better calculated to bolster 
up his reputation than to justify me." Justify? 
Why, Revel himself admitted the forgery ! True, 
he assures us that his counsel had advised him to 
plead guilty as a means of securing acquittal ; but 
the statement does not bear examination. Never- 
theless, at the date of his trial, Revel thought 
differently, and in his eyes Lebon was Cicero and 
Demosthenes rolled into one ; he dedicated to 
him acrostics and panegyrics, of which it will be 
sufficient to give a specimen to form a definite 
judgment of their merits: — 

Acrostic dedicated to M. Lebou, Jurisconsult, by Jcan-Honor'e- 
Francois Revel, Captain of Dragoons. 

h es Dieux, en le créant, voulurent ajix mortels 
E tt lui faire trouver un protecteur, un pire, 
B on, docte, grand, aux malheureux prospère, 
O n doit à ses vertus élever des autels : 
Ncj cœurs reconnaissants seront son sanctuaire.^ 

" Monsieur, — Alexandre défendit aux mauvais 
peintres de faire son portrait ; les poètes médiocres 

^ " The Gods, when they created him, were fain to make 
mortals find in him a protector, a father; good, erudite, sublime, 
to the unfortunate a boon, we should raise altars to his virtues ; 
our grateful hearts will be his sanctuary." 



48 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

devaient s'interdire votre éloge, et je serais impar- 
donable de l'avoir entrepris dans ce faible acrostiche, 
si j'avais eu moins la prétention de faire un ouvrage 
digne de vous que de satisfaire mon cœur embrasé 
de la plus ardente reconnaissance, — J'ai l'honneur, 
etc., Revel." 

" Sir, — Alexander the Great forbade bad artists 
to paint his portrait ; so inferior poets should refrain 
from your panegyric, and my fault were unpardon- 
able in having attempted it in this poor acrostic, 
if I had had any thought of producing anything 
worthy of you rather than of satisfying my heart 
that is on fire with the most ardent gratitude. — I 
have the honour to be, etc., Revel." 

He was delighted, then, overjoyed to have been 
rescued by Lebon from a tight corner. Indeed it 
would have been hard for him not to be pleased ! 
He had been condemned to a paltry two years' 
imprisonment. "The special Court of Versailles," 
he says, "scrupled to ruin me, an unfortunate officer 
whose greatest crime was to have married too 
beautiful a bride." His case would seem to have 
come under the law, a temporary and exceptional 
enactment, of 23 Floréal, Year x, suspending till 
the conclusion of peace the adjudication of charges 
of forgery by a jury. Article vi of this law directed 
the exposure of the culprit in a public place and the 
branding of the letter F with a red-hot iron on his 
shoulder, even if condemned for a first offence. 



SENTENCE 49 

But, takincr into consideration the extenuatinor 
circumstances, the Court gave Revel the benefit 
of the freedom allowed it by Article 646 of the 
Criminal Code, and modified the penalty. Thus 
he escaped the branding and public exposure, to 
say nothing of the wearing of irons. " This punish- 
ment was not inflicted, therefore I was not guilty," 
we shall find Revel boasting subsequently. By 
parity of reasoning a malefactor of to-day might 
take advantage of the law of reprieve and then 
asseverate : "I have not been in jail, therefore I 
am innocent ! " Faulty logic, surely ! '' How comes 
it that, convicted of forgery of commercial docu- 
ments, an offence punishable by our laws with hard 
labour and exposure to public derision, you were 
spared this painful and degrading punishment ; why 
did you enjoy this unheard-of clemency ? " he was 
asked later on by the Deputy Procureur of the 
King, M. de Marchangy. To which the answer 
was : " This clemency you owe to the intervention 
on your behalf of your accusers themselves ! " 
Here we have the question brought back to its true 
point of view and the angle from which it should be 
looked at. 

On the day following Revel's arrest, Mme 
Campan had turned her attention to Ëlconore's 
future lot, and had appealed in her favour to the 
protection of her former pupil Caroline Murat. 
The latter had always continued on the best of 
4 



50 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

terms with her old school-mistress, "But really," 
the Queen of Naples remarked to her once, " I am 
astonished you are not more intimidated before us ; 
you talk to us as freely as when we were your 
pupils ! " To which Mme Campan retorted : " The 
best thing you can do is to forget your titles when 
you are with me, for I could hardly be afraid 
of queens to whom I often gave punishments." 
The tone of this conversation indicates how it was 
Mme Campan managed to persuade Caroline to 
take immediate steps to place Êléonore in an 
educational establishment at Chantilly. It points 
also to the reason why the advocate Lebon em- 
ployed Mme Campan's influence to induce Murat 
and Caroline to intervene in his client's favour. 
Revel, to whom he spoke of his intention, raised 
no objection, indeed urged him to take the step, 
writing to him : " Now is perhaps the time to take 
advantage of the promises made you by a certain 
exalted personage. You will then decide whether 
a first token of interest would be sufficient, or if a 
second might not become necessary. I am on the 
eve. Sir, of owing you more than life." I would 
remark that the " exalted personage " is no other 
than Murat, whom Revel at a later date, after his 
release from prison, accused of having co-operated 
in his ruin and disgrace and the abduction of his 
wife. For the present I pass on. All the evidence 
points to the conclusion that the Murats interested 



INFLUENCE IN HIGH PLACES 51 

themselves in Revel's fate and did what was need- 
ful to spare him the shame of public exposure and 
branding. During Caroline's stay at the Camp of 
Boulogne her secretary wrote thus to Revel's 
counsel : — 

" The Princess's absence is much to be re^rretted 
under these circumstances, but must not rob us of 
all hope. If it is no longer possible to get sentence 
deferred, we must of course await the issue, and 
then demand a delay so that this sentence may not 

be carried out immediately. M. A , a member 

of the Corps Législatif, for years in relations with 
Their Majesties, is quite willing, in their name, to 
undertake with the Minister of Justice and Police 
such steps as you shall deem necessary ; the 
Princess, on her return, would solicit in your client's 
favour His Majesty's clemency. The interest you 
display in this matter alone leads me to hope that 
you will see fit to come to an understanding with 

M. A or write to him. I can assure you 

beforehand that the Princess will be gratified by 
whatever you may do to save, if not from infamy, 
at any rate from the harshest penalties it involves, 
the husband of an unhappy woman whose sufferings 
she is keenly desirous of alleviating." 

Of the protection so afforded him Revel was 
well aware, — so much so that while in prison he 
had dedicated to Murat in a complimentary epistle 
prefixed to the volume a work on army administra- 



52 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

tion which he had just completed. But Napoleon 
"devoted me to infamy!" he repeats the cry. A 
charge easy to make, but which these documents 
render somewhat futile. If, really and truly, the 
Emperor had made up his mind to ruin Revel, 
would the Murats have gone out of their way to 
save him in defiance of the Imperial pleasure .-^ 
Was it not all to Murats interest, as Napoleon's 
accomplice in the abduction of Éléonore, to abandon 
the victim to his wretched fate ? What call to 
deliver the man it had been decided to ruin ? Such 
questions are hardly worth asking, but we are 
forced to put them by the statements Revel makes 
in his rôle of martyr. In fact M. de Marchangy 
was even now urging with irrefutable logic : "An 
appointment to a higher rank, a distant frontier 
post, in a dangerous service, one where at any rate 
he could have fallen with honour, these were the 
means whereby a criminal meditating a second 
crime would have removed Revel from his wife's 
side." But, granting all this to be pure hypothesis, 
there still remains the question of the promissory 
note. How will he make us believe that the 
Emperor had any hand in this ? Well, this is how. 
If we are to credit his story. La Feuille's accounts 
which he had put in order still showed fatal dis- 
crepancies. " La Feuille, who had but dissimulated 
his hatred of me after I had discovered his 
malpractices, became the tool of Buonaparte and 



A DILEMMA 53 

Murat in an infernal machination to which it is 
impossible to believe that Mme Campan was not a 
party." 

To leave Mme Campan out of the question for 
the moment, let us consider by way of clearing up 
the problem two alternative hypotheses, — either the 
bill is a forgery, or it is authentic. If forged, 
it is vital to Revel's interests to pay it instantly on 
demand. Why not have drawn on the famous 
pocket-book and its 100,000 francs, with which he 
had dazzled the Denuelles' eyes, in order to liqui- 
date the debt? Possessing 100,000 francs, why 
does he give promissory notes to cover so insignifi- 
cant an obligation ? But he does not pay this 
petty 2000 francs. The conclusion follows he does 
not possess the 100,000 francs. Has he any funds 
at all available? "I had," he says, "a nice little 
fortune, honestly come by, of which my first wife's 
dowry constituted a part." A statement hardly 
consistent with General Canclaux's memorandum 
of the 25 Messidor, Year xi, in which Revel is 
sicrnalized as "bavins: no means of livelihood or of 
supporting his family." Now his wife was dead 
before the Year xi. If she had had a dowry, it 
would have been in Revel's possession at the 
time of General Canclaux's inspection, and there 
would have been no need to recommend him 
to "the Government's compassion." Hence we 
may fairly conclude that Revel's 100,000 francs 



54 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

in Year xii are a myth, for if he had had them, 
he would have been under no necessity to sign 
promissory notes for meals supplied by the inn- 
keeper Sorel. 

Is the note of hand authentic ? Then why does 
Revel let himself be arrested, tried, and condemned 
without appealing to the evidence of an expert in 
handwriting? Why is he ready to admit before 
the Criminal Court of Versailles that the acceptance 
is foro-ed ? He has vouchsafed no explanation of 
this negative attitude, and we are driven to the 
conclusion that, if the note of hand is authentic, 
Revel's conduct is incomprehensible and only shows 
the falsity of his pretensions about his wonderful 
pocket-book and its 100,000 francs. If it is a 
forgery, then the lack of this 100,000 francs must 
have led him to raise money fraudulently and, in 
the last resort, justly incur the condemnation, the 
origin of which he has so generously referred to 
Napoleon. " He devoted me to infamy." Excel- 
lent. But I am bound to say I think Revel was 
partly responsible for this infamy. 

I am going to give him a long rope ; I assume 
his innocence, I grant him to have been the victim 
of persecution. In that case his past will speak for 
him ; his future will prove him to have been an 
officer and a gentleman, who has shaken himself 
free from a disastrous scrape and now asks nothing 
better than to continue an honourable career, a 



A SHADY PAST 



SS 



worthy sequel to this unsulHed past. What are 
the facts ? He presents himself before us with one 
single testimonial of character, that of the Com- 
missioner of the Executive Directory in connexion 
with the Central Administration of the Saone-et- 
Loire, which, recommending him to the Ministry 
of War, declares : "He is a man of irreproachable 
integrity." So far, so good. I examine the rest 
of his "dossier" at the Ministry of War, and what 
is the first thing that meets the eye ? A memoran- 
dum of General Canclaux, dated four years later, 
in which he is stated to be "strongly suspected 
from the point of view of integrity." Coming 
to the 2 2 Vendémiaire, Year x, I find him to 
be under accusation on the part of the Council 
of War on account of his manacrement of 
accounts as Paymaster of the 15th Regiment of 
Dragoons. In iSio he is acrain on the active 
list, and I come upon him in the 6ist Regiment 
of the Line with 7000 francs of debt against 
him. In 181 1 he has been transferred to the 
3;th Regiment of Infantry ; he is in debt to 
the tune of 20,000 francs, and the Council of 
Administration demands his dismissal from the 
regiment. In 181 2 the Brigadier-General of the 
37th reports to the Minister of War on Revel's 
misconduct, incapacity, immorality. Peccadilloes, 
yQu say. But there is more to come; in 1810 he 
is convicted of squandering the funds realized 



s 6 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

on the sale of the regimental stock of cloth- 
ing and boots. Sentence : a month's imprison- 
ment and stoppage of one-fifth of his pay. Same 
year : his accounts are declared to be in the most 
involved state. There you have the man, the 
innocent victim of the Year xiii. Obviously he 
has every title, every right to call himself a martyr, 
a poor persecuted martyr ! 

To sum up — here, I imagine, is what we may 
conclude to be the truth about him and the whole 
transaction ; a good-looking scamp, with no money 
and no scruples, is on the look-out for a girl with 
a dowry, and he thought he had lighted on the blue 
bird of fortune in the person of Éléonore. With 
his fine speeches he took in the Denuelles, adven- 
turers of the same kidney, anxious to make an 
advantageous match for their daughter. To play 
the part, Revel was obliged to borrow money of 
La Feuille and others, and put promissory notes 
and forged bills in circulation, which he took up 
before they matured. One of these little arrange- 
ments went wrong, and he was caught. As an 
old schoolfellow of Êléonore's at Saint-Germain, 
Caroline Murat interested herself in the evil plight 
of this rascal, and rescued the wife from destitution 
by admitting her to her household. There, chance 
threw her in the Emperor's way ; she became his 
mistress, and Revel, in 1814, found it easy to dress 
up the romantic story to suit his own purposes, and 



IN JAIL 57 

to pose as victim of "the Corsican," and of the 
"odious" Murat. Just this, neither more nor less. 
A comparison of dates and the evidence of sundry 
official documents included in Revel's "dossier" 
confirm our view and enable us to follow out the 
drama. Henceforth we know what to think, and 
all we have now to do is to narrate the subsequent 
episodes of this strange, eventful history. We 
have shown there is no need to appeal to high 
motives of abstract morality in pleading Napoleon's 
case against Revel. A mere examination of the 
facts has sufficed to justify our defence of his 
behaviour in the affair. 

Immediately after his condemnation the ex- 
dragoon was jailed at Versailles. But the succu- 
lent repasts he had enjoyed at the Denuelles' table 
and at Sorel's had whetted his appetite for good 
living, which had always been keen and dainty. 
The prison fare supplied by Dame Mariotte, who 
acted as jailer, was by no means to his taste. 
He feared its effects on his internal economy, and 
petitioned for his transfer to the prison of Dourdan, 
where Auffroy, the jailer there, enjoyed a better 
culinary reputation. His request was granted, and, 
with six francs in his pocket, Revel arrived at 
Dourdan. His first experiences there, however, 
so he says, were painful. His thoughts dwelt on 
his trial and sentence, and already he could discern 



58 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

incriminating traces of "Buonaparte's" machina- 
tions in the matter. His mind was possessed 
with the blackest designs. " I pondered deeds 
of vengeance, I pictured my oppressors already 
standing in the dock." Indeed, what else could 
he do in a prison cell ? He does not add that 
he also composed rhymed acrostics to the 
glory of his advocate, and laboured at dedica- 
tions of works to His Majesty the Emperor and 
King. 

Sometimes, too, he thought of his Êléonore. 
What was become of her? Through M. Lebon 
he learned that she had been placed, in the first 
instance, " I have never known why," at the 
educational establishment kept by Mme Pingre 
at Chantilly. There, it seemed, she was taking 
part in processions, " armed with the banner of 
salvation, which her hands profaned," There it 
was that Caroline, touched by her forsaken and 
unhappy condition, had gone to see her and take 
her into her household in the capacity of reader, 
companion, — the office was evidently a sinecure 
and a mere cloak for charity. The news set 
Revel screaming with impotent fury: "They left 
me to groan in a prison cell, while my wife still 
aired her graces in gilded halls of splendour." He 
soon knew what to think of it. "Êléonore was 
dishonoured, she was no more worthy of my 
love." But he, with his sentence of two years' 



SUIT FOR DIVORCE 59 

imprisonment duly recorded in the official registers ? 
. . . W'ell, he must practise resignation. His wife 
had betrayed him, he would console himself "with 
the Muses," and strive to live "like a philosopher 
who defies the unrighteous." 

But the "unrighteous" were not at the end of 
their tether. Early in April 1806, nearly seven 
years after his condemnation, he received a stamped 
paper that dumbfounded him. His wife was suing 
for a divorce! On February 13 she had lodged 
her petition at the Mairie of the ist Arrondissement. 
On April 11 it was accepted, but on the 15th the 
authorities demanded that the proceedings be de- 
clared null and void, on the ground that Elëonore 
was under age. Th(; Court authorized her to 
call in the assistance of an advisory council 
appointed by itself. On March 28 she produced 
witnesses who testified that "the man Revel had 
insulted and maltreated his wife," that he " had 
overwhelmed her with the most disgusting epithets," 
that he "had struck her in the face," that he "had 
pushed her from him with violence and beaten her 
with his fists without motive or provocation of 
any kind." I must freely own it ; these witnesses 
do not strike me as altogether trustworthy. As 
a rule, a husband who holds himself justified in 
using fist and foot to bring his helpmeet to a right 
way of thinking does not invite a varied and well- 
chosen assortment of spectators to look on at the 



6o AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

ceremony. Revel, little as I sympathize with that 
pretentious and wrong-headed individual, does not 
appear to me likely to have resorted to these harsh 
and brutal measures after two months of married 
life. On this point, then, I think we must give him 
the benefit of the doubt. 

But on her side, Êléonore had other and better 
reasons to plead? Had not the disgrace of 
Revel's condemnation recoiled on her? Had not 
the very walls of Versailles where the sentence had 
been placarded proclaimed the infamy which her 
name compelled her to share ? On demand made 
and by a deed executed before the Dourdan 
Notary on April 20, Revel acquiesced. He says it 
was because her lawyers heM the knife to his throat 
in his prison : " Divorce or transportation to 
Cayenne ! " Revel preferred to let the case go 
by default rather than take a voyage to the 
colonies. Armed with this document, Éléonore 
demanded a decree of divorce, and, on April 29, 
1806, Charles- Hugues Montaran, Mayor of the 
ist Arrondissement, pronounced it in her favour 
in presence of Jean-Claude Henry, Jurisconsult, 
residing in the Rue Feydeau ; Jean Peborde, 
Doctor of Medicine, Rue Neuve-des-Capucines ; 
Georges Beuret, Major, Senior Aide-de-Camp of 
General Delaborde, residing at No, 4 Rue de la 
Vrillière, and Charles-Michel Janvier, Chief Sec- 
retary to his Imperial Highness Prince Joachim 



LA MATRIMONIMANIE 6i 

Murât. Henceforward, between Revel and 
Êléonore every tie was severed. The Denuelles 
were rid of the incubus of this terrible son-in-law. 
As for him, he turned again to the Muses. The 
bitter memory of these calamities was his inspiration. 
On the history of his marriage he composed a long 
poem entitled La Matri7nonimanie, in which we 
may well believe the shafts of his sarcasm fell thick 
and fast on Mme Campan's devoted head. Revel 
used to read it aloud for the entertainment of his 
companions in captivity. One of these, accordingly, 
when he came to be released, found nothing more 
urgent to do than to go to Mme Campan and 
denounce the Matr-'vionifuanie and its author. 
The effect was not lono- in followinof. In the last 
days of January 1807 Quartermaster-Sergeant 
Guenin paid a domiciliary visit to the two pretty 
rooms furnished and occupied by Revel at 
Dourdan. There he laid hands on a great quantity 
of papers and nineteen bundles of manuscript. 
There was nothing very compromising in all this 
for the prisoner. " I had been wise enough," he 
says jokingly, "to play with my chains." In any 
case the day of his release was drawing nigh. In 
March 1S07 his prison gates were opened and 
springtide greeted him with a smile on the threshold 
of the jail. His ill-omened adventure was over 
and done with — save and except the bitter 
memories of captivity, and deep in his heart 



62 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

a savage craving for reprisals, for revenge, 
wh,ch for seven long years yet he had to chew 
and chew again amid the contradictory avatars 
which still awaited him in the sequel of his 
Stormy life. 



CHAPTER III 
NAPOLEON AND ÉLÉONORE 

The Emperor encounters Revel's wife — Part played by Caroline 
and Murat in the affair — The house in the Rue de la 
Victoire — Disappointments and disillusions — Love in a 
hurry ; or the story of a timepiece — Éléonore a mother — 
The Emperor receives the news — Napoleon's " brutality " 
with women — The pamphleteers — The child's future — 
Brought up under a false name — Visits to the Tuileries — 
Meneval, the Emperor's confidential secretary — An oddly 
constituted family council — Napoleon settles a competence 
on Léon — His farewells in 1815 to his two natural sons — 
The Emperor at St. Helena mindful of Leon's interests — A 
secret codicil. 

It is now to Éléonore we must return and her 
liaison with her Imperial lover. After her removal 
from Chantilly we saw her enter Caroline's house- 
hold as reader and companion. By Revel's showing, 
she became Murat's mistress very soon after that 
event. Naturally this disgraceful intrigue did not 
long remain a secret to the Emperor's sister. In a 
very short time it was an open scandal. " Furious 
to find a rival in the field, she made haste to 
denounce the guilty pair to Buonaparte, and de- 
mand vengeance." I cannot say I think the step 

a likely one for her to have taken — but there it 

63 



64 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

is, Revel says so. Napoleon promised condign 
punishment, and sent to announce his coming. 
Caroline immediately organized a fête — another 
improbability, surely ! It was in the middle of 
a ball, and half-way through a supper, that the 
thunderbolt was to fall on the faithless Joachim 
and the ungrateful Êléonore. The Emperor arrived. 
Speechless, abashed, in the front row of the Ladies 
of the Household, stood Revel's wife awaiting 
sentence. The master walked by, looked at her, 
and, by a piece of clumsiness, upset a cup of coffee 
over her dress. At this "she burst into tears amid 
a chorus of mocking laughter and sarcasm, dis- 
playing a grace and modesty that were enchanting." 
Wonder of wonders! Confused, agitated, enchanted, 
the Emperor "declared his passion, lover-like, in 
Éléonore's ear, while, sovereign-wise, he signified 
his choice by a glance to his courtiers." 'Pon my 
word ! you might suppose Revel had been present 
at the scene. No ; we cannot believe in these pre- 
liminaries. The truth is simpler. 

Returning from the campaign of Austerlitz, 
Napoleon reached Paris January 26, 1806, at ten 
o'clock at night. Next day he received the Council 
of State ; on the 28th the high functionaries of the 
Empire ; on the 29th he gave audience, at one 
o'clock, to the diplomatic body ; on the 30th he 
inspected the works in progress at the Louvre, and 
in the evening was present at a representation of 



THROWING THE HANDKERCHIEF 65 

Méhul's play, Stratonice, at the Théâtre Feydeau. 
It was during the last two or three days of this 
brief period that he paid a visit to his sister 
Caroline, and then, as chance would have it, met 
Êléonore. Her looks pleased him ; the girl, escaped 
from the nightmare she had just lived through, siill 
showed signs of sadness, traces of scarce forgotten 
terror. The freshness of her eighteen summers, 
the pathos of her sorrows, the charm of her youth, 
all this formed a vision of beauty, rendered the 
more alluring by what was known of her tragic 
story. No mistress so young as this had hitherto 
fascinated Napoleon, who, even before Joséphine, 
had always been drawn to women of riper charms.^ 

^ As to this preference of Napoleon's, here is a little known 
piece of evidence extracted from a letter of the Burgundian 
Rathier's, a man who was actively concerned in the Revo- 
lutionary movement in his Department. "At the time of the 
suppression of the religious orders," he writes, " the monks of 
Citeaux were not of one mind with the Abbot with regard to the 
spoils of the House. The authorities of the Dijon district, being 
warned that four puncheons filled with silver plate were going to 
be removed, sent Commissioners to the Abbey, whose authority 
was misconstrued by the monks. The Commissioners having 
demanded armed assistance from the Department, I ordered to 
the spot a company of the Artillery Regiment — at that time in 
garrison at Auxonne, of which Bonaparte, then a lieutenant, was 
in command. While the Commissioners, supported by this 
military force, were taking an inventory of the furniture and 
fittings and clearing the premises of the monks, Bonaparte, 
weary of his stay in this gloomy place buried among the woods, 
entrusted the command to his sergeant-major, and betook him- 
self to Seurre, a small town in the neighbourhood. There the 
young officer was received on friendly terms in the best houses ; 
5 



66 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

Not one of them all, from Grassini to George, 
was so frail, so delicate, possessed of so ingenuous 
a charm of innocent youth and untoward fortune. 
A flower scarce touched, a blossom all but unsullied, 
that fascinated his senses on the spot. " Offers 
made through a third party were instantly accepted," 
states a witness of the circumstances. Constant, the 
Emperor's body-servant. Napoleon's whim was 
not likely to meet with any obstacle either from 
Murat or Caroline. Quite the contrary. As for 
Caroline, " she flattered his tastes, lent him the use 
of her house if any sudden fancy made it necessary 
for his purposes." Indeed, for a long time now, 

he was especially assiduous in his visits to Mme Prieur, whose 
husband, a man of advanced years, had been President of the 
Salt House. It is a known fact that the lady, quite young and 
pretty still, was not unkind to him. Bonaparte, compelled to 
return to his men, and afterwards away on active service, seemed 
to have forgotten her. Nevertheless, on his return from Italy, 
in Year v, bringing with him Mme Murat, his sister, who was 
still a girl, and whom he had just removed from a place of 
education, he could not refrain from making a detour from his 
direct route to pay a visit to Seurre. There he put up at the 
inn, from which he sent word to Mme Prieur that an intimate 
friend of hers, fatigued with travelling, and unable to drag him- 
self to her house, begged her to come and see him. Mme Prieur 
hesitated long ere she accepted the invitation. She was not a 
little surprised to recognize Bonaparte, and especially to find 
him accompanied by a young lady whom she believed to be 
anything but a sister. However, she was soon put in possession 
of the facts, and a tender reconciliation took place between 
them. Mme Prieur, now a widow, could only follow her hero 
in thought in his Egyptian journey, and only found herself in a 
position to learn its particulars at the date of his return from 







Cakoi.ink Mlkat. 

From .1 Lithograph by IIoi'Wooi). 



A COMPLAISANT COUPLE 67 

even going back as far as the Consulate, Murat and 
his wife had "striven to secure their influence by- 
rousing in the Consul's mind passing caprices, the 
secret satisfaction of which they afterwards en- 
couraged." Yet we are told of Napoleon that 
"immorality offended him." Anyway, he put up 
very well with the Murats, and did not refuse the 
helping hand they gave him with Éléonore. But 
Êléonore ! To go straight from Revel to Napoleon ! 
A miraculous turn of fate, but one she never con- 
trived, it would appear, to live up to, as we must 
allow when we come to the sequel and conclusion 
of the escapade. 

Again, according to Revel, "after the fete of 
Marengo, when he passed through Chalon-sur-Saône, whither 
she had retired after leaving Seurre. She thought she could 
take advantage of this ancient intrigue to make the fortune of 
her family, and obtain a place for herself in MniC Bonaparte's 
household. She only succeeded in getting a registracy for one 
of her brothers, and failed in the rest, particularly in obtaining a 

post as Receiver-General for L , District Receiver at Semur" 

{Revue Bleue, 28 juin 1S94; p. 799). — There is at least one 
inaccuracy in the account : it was Elisa, and not Caroline, who 
left the school of Saint-Louis at Saint-Cyr, where she had gone 
as a pupil on June 22, 1784. She left the establishment, not 
in the Year v, but on September i, 1792. Cf. Pétition de 
Buonaparte et de sa sœur Marie- Anne- Êlisa {Mme Bacciochî). 
Caen, 1842 ; 8vo. — Here is yet another mention of a mistress 
of Bonaparte's as little known as Mme Prieur. March 10, 
183S: "I also saw a Mme Martinetti, who was Napoleon's 
mistress during his first Egyptian campaign. She is sixty-five; 
does not look more than forty, and is still very handsome " 
— Lord Malmesbury, Memoirs of a Former Minister (1S07- 
1869). 



68 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

Neuilly, Eléonore was installed in the temple of 
Buonaparte's pleasures in the Rue des Victoires, 
under the guard of Regnault de Saint- Jean 
d'Angely, a novel kind of eunuch who, more than 
the Sultan, enjoyed the favours of the Odalisque." 

I will deal later on with Reynaud de Saint- 
Jean d'Angely, only stopping for the present 
to give a brief account of this much-talked-of 
" temple of Buonaparte's pleasures." It stood in 
the erstwhile Rue Chantereine, renamed, 8 Nivôse, 
Year vi. Rue de la Victoire in virtue of a decision 
of the Central Administration of the Department of 
Paris, desirous of " consecrating the triumph of the 
French armies by one of those monuments that 
recall the simplicity of ancient manners."^ Revel 
says the house was No. 29. It was not therefore 
the former Hôtel Bonaparte where he came to live 
the day after his marriage, and which he gave, on 
July I, 1806, to Lefèbvre-Desnoëttes, whose widow 
ceded it in 1857 to M. Goubie, a retired stock- 
broker, and in connexion with which, under date of 
June 15, 1853, the following document was laid 
before Napoleon m : — 

" M. V°' Vaton, owner of the former Hôtel 
Bonaparte, petitions for authorization to establish a 
market on this site. He explains the advantages 
which would result therefrom. He asks no sub- 

1 Became the Rue Chantereine again in 18 16; reverted to 
the name of Rue de la Victoire once more in 1833. 



RUE DE LA VICTOIRE 69 

vention from the City, and would agree to surrender 
the ownership of the market to it on the expiration 
of a fixed period of time. lie pledges himself to 
construct in the middle of the market a monument 
that shall perpetuate the memory of the 18 Brumaire. 
Mme V''= Flandrin gives an assurance that the 
Municipality of Paris has already welcomed these 
proposals and she prays the Emperor to pronounce 
in favour of M. Vaton, an old friend of her 
deceased husband's." 

The house disappeared under the Second 
Empire, and nothing is left of it to-day but the 
walls enclosing a plot of ground in private hands 
within the courtyard of No. 60 in the Rue de la 
Victoire.^ It is clearly proved then that Êléonore's 
son, the Comte Léon, is profoundly mistaken when 
he writes, in 1S56, that this is the house from which 
'* Napoleon i., then Consul {s?c) set out to accom- 

^ Regarding this house, I print below a curious letter from 
M. Frédéric Masson from the original picked up out of a 
catalogue of autographs. 

"Monsieur, — The hôtel which Joséphine bought in the Rue 
Chantereine extended from No. 46 in that street, where it 
abutted by a kind of cul-de-sac on No. 61 of the Rue Saint- 
Lazare, including No. 53. No. 59 formed a separate house 
surrounded by the other buildings, an enclave. Given by the 
Emperor to General Lefbbvre-Desnoëttes, at the time of his 
marriage with Mile Rolier, a cousin of Madame, it was sold about 
1 85 7 by the General's widow to M. Goubie, a stockbroker, who 
pulled it down and built houses facing the opening of the Rue 
du Cardinal Fesch, now the Rue de Châteaudun. . . . 

•' Frédéric Masson." 



70 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

plish the coup d'état of i8 Brumaire," and that he 
himself, Léon, was born there. I would remark 
by the way that I am unacquainted with the docu- 
ments on which the statement can be based that 
on January 30, 1806, Éléonore was installed in the 
house adjoining the Elysée, afterwards the Hôtel 
Sébastiani, occupied in 1848 by Miss Howard, 
mistress of Louis Napoleon, and which disappeared 
in i860, when the Rue d'Elysée was opened. One 
simple fact points to the real truth. On 22 Nivôse, 
Year x, Murat had bought in the Rue de Provence 
the former Hôtel Thélusson, subsequently Hôtel 
du Gouvernement. It was there his wife's 
daughter, Letizia-Joséphine, was born, April 25, 
1802. It was there also that Eléonore was domi- 
ciled. Later on she removed to No. 29 in the Rue 
de la Victoire, to a house which she had bought on 
August 29, 1806, with money given her by the 
Emperor from a certain M. Henry, who was called 
upon to play an active and confidential rôle in her 
life, and to whom she sold it back on February 3, 
1808. I am well aware many of these details are 
superfluous ; but I am bound to give them inasmuch 
as all we know of Eléonore's life is what Revel has 
seen fit to say and write — and that is the worst 
side of it. 

The Emperor's mistress, thus raised by Fortune's 
favour to this exalted destiny, we must follow in 
this new page of her life. 



AT THE TUILERIES 71 

Complaisant as the Murats might be, Napoleon 
could not go on for ever using their house as a 
place of assignation. So Ëlconore went to the 

Tuileries. " The fair E came to the piilace 

secretly, but only seldom, and she used not to stay 
more than two or three hours there," Constant 
says. It is therefore incorrect to believe, with 
Baron Fain (First Private Secretary of the 
Emperor), that the Emperor never had with her 
" more than a casual meeting at a masked ball." 
Again, it is a mere fairy-tale what another writer 
says : "If we refer to the memoirs of the time, 
Napoleon would seem to have passed only one 
night with her, although taking the precaution of 
noting the date in a memorandum-book." How is 
it possible to trust this author, who adds : *' She who 
was Comte's Leon's mother was a German whom 
her Imperial lover has made Comtesse de 
Luxbourg." As if, even in this imperfectly known 
history, anybody could fail to be aware of Êléonore's 
Parisian origin and not know the fact that she 
became Comtesse de Luxbourg by a third marriage 
— and that without "the Imperial lover" having 
any hand in the matter ! 

However, pending her elevation to this dignity, 
she lived in obscurity, under the name of Mme de 
Saint-Laurent, "a name of harlotry my wife had 
adopted when she forsook the nuptial bed to win 
herself the title of prostitute on the couches of 



72 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

Imperial luxury," declares in disgust the immaculate 
and moral Revel. The honour of sharing these 
"couches of Imperial luxury" did not, in any case, 
fill her with any great enthusiasm. " She has told 
us herself how, in the chamber where Napoleon re- 
ceived her, a clock hung on the wall of the recess 
where the bed stood, and how, while the Emperor 
was at work, she would contrive to alter the 
minute hand and put it on half an hour. The 
time Napoleon gave to his amusements was strictly 
apportioned ; so, when he raised his head and 
looked at the timepiece : ' What, already ! ' he 
would cry, and the fond mistress would find herself 
free to go." But, if the ex-husband is to be 
listened to, this was by no means the only pretty 
trick she used to play her lover. The latter, 
deeply smitten, demanded a letter from her every 
day. As the poor girl lacked the enthusiasm 
needful for such a task, it was her mother who took 
charge of the correspondence. One day there 
came a dead stop ; mother and daughter had had 
a squabble. The Emperor sent for the neglectful 
letter-writer and questioned her ; dissatisfied with 
the halting explanations she gave, he was on 
the point of sending her to the right about there 
and then. But Mme Campan, the clever, the 
tactful Mme Campan, was on the watch. To save 
the situation and her credit, she could only think of 
one way, one piece of advice to give Éléonore — 



LOVE IN A HURRY 73 

to declare herself cficeinte. "Whether you are or 
not, my dear, you vmst be ! " And she was, and 
won back her lover. 

Êlconore became encci)itc in the first fortnight 
of March 1S06 — on the 13th, Revel gives the 
exact date. This date is not actually impossible, 
the Emperor having been from March i to 31 
in Paris, at Saint-Cloud or at Malmaison. On 
the 13th, however, after a visit to the two 
Trianons, at Versailles, which he ordered to be 
put in a state of repair, he returned for the night to 
Malmaison. But on the ist, 3rd, 8th, loth, 12th, 
17th, iSth, 23rd, and 24th, he did not leave Paris. 
The confinement took place at No. 29 Rue de la 
Victoire, December 13, 1806, at two in the morning. 
The necessary assistance was rendered by Pierre 
Marchais, accoucheur, living at No. 29 Rue des 
Fossés - Saint - Germain - I'Auxerrois. He was 
seconded by the celebrated Guillaume Andral, of 
the Academy of Medicine, at that time Physician 
to the Invalides. It was these two, accompanied 
by Jacques-Rene-Marie Aymé, Military Treasurer 
of the Legion of Honour, residing not far from 
Ëléonore, at No. 24 Rue Saint-Georges, who went 
on Monday, December 15, to register the birth at 
the Mairie of the 2nd Arrondissement — the same 
Mairie where, a few months previously, her divorce 
from Revel had been pronounced. The child was 
called Léon, — the second half of the father's 



74 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

mighty name, — and this latter was described as 
absent. Absent indeed he was, and far enough 
away, yonder in snowy Poland, at Pultusk, where 
a courier dispatched by Caroline brought him on 
December 31 the news of the child's birth. A 
joyful New Year's gift ! He was a father at last. 
The hope so long, so ardently cherished with 
Joséphine, and all in vain, was realized; here in 
this far-off, foreign bivouac, amid the ice and snow 
and bitter blasts of a wintry land, he heard the 
news that promised his race the victory over time 
and assured the future of his dynasty. The 
tenderest and proudest of blessings was sped to 
the little wailing babe in the Rue de la Victoire 
and a father's happiness decreed the future happi- 
ness of its days. " 'Tis not alone in the hippo- 
dromes that the august goddess of Victory has 
crowned thee conqueror ! " so ran the inscriptions 
on the statues in the Hippodrome at Byzantium, 
in homage of the victors. Victory in war was now 
united for the Emperor with the joy of fatherhood, 
and, lavish in her gifts, the Fortune of that hour 
mingled therewith the most amorous visions. 

It was on January i, on the road to Warsaw, at 
the posthouse of Bronie, that Napoleon had for the 
first time seen Mme Walewska, the very woman 
who was to a:ive him the second of his sons. 
Strange chances and changes of the most amazing- 
destiny ever human being had ! To learn he is 



HAPPY TIDINGS 75 

a father at the same instant the first smile is 
exchanged with the woman who is to do her part 
too in perpetuating his race, who is to do her part 
too in rcHeving the monotony of the Rue de la 
Victoire, a street consecrated to the Emperor's 
amours — a series extending from Joséphine 
de Beauharnais to Marie Louise, Comtesse 
Walewska, through Elëonore and how many others, 
quickly dismissed, forgotten, vanished ! But he is 
a father, a father for the first time, and his heart 
swells with the most radiant hopes. It is the 
mother's opportunity — and she uses it ! Gold 
was poured out like water, Revel assures us, in 
the Rue de la Victoire, to reward her merits. 
There was no favour too great to ask, none too 
great to win — even the arrest of her mother, with 
whom her relations were just then strained. 
Êlconore was reigning favourite. Nay, better than 
that. " A little more and Buonaparte would have 
shared his crown with her." It is the ex-dras^oon 
who says so — and he believes it, for he repeats 
elsewhere: "Napoleon intended to marry her." 
Intended? . . . well, it never went beyond that. 

But, in plain fact, had he ever thought of such 
a thing ? Once during the Russian campaign the 
Emperor, sending out a battalion of his Guard to 
attack the enemy, thus addressed the men : " Up 
and at 'em, grenadiers! In war, the same as in 
love, we must see folk at close quarters." Well, 



76 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

the fact is, by now he had seen Éléonore at close 
quarters, and something very Hke indifference had 
succeeded to the tender sentiment of January 
1806. " He had sickened of the fair one because, 
in the very middle of love's 'sweet nothings,' she 
had begun on politics." No, no, it is not true. 
Poor Éléonore surely was the last person to trouble 
her head about politics ! And on his side, far 
other thoughts than love dreams dominated his 
mind, "What did he want with passion, with 
fleshly lusts, with women?" one author (Suarès, 
De Napoléon) asks. Very little, truly, — just 
enough to satisfy the momentary caprices of his 
appetite. Woman was a passing whim. As for 
love, has he not been made to say : " Love is a 
piece of folly done by two " ? He often swore it 
was so, and many a time he proved it to fond 
women who hoped better things of him than the 
fleeting favour that bounded the horizon of his 
desires. There were instances where he proved it 
in such brutal fashion as led Mme de Rémusat to 
declare in scorn that " Bonaparte is without educa- 
tion or orood manners." Indeed she hits the bull's- 
eye when she adds : " The Emperor despises 
women ; he cannot learn to love them." Did he 
wish to learn ? Was it love he wanted of them ? 
Indeed, no ! If it was, it must be owned he had 
strange ways of seeking it. A contemporary has 
stated that he " was not always over and above polite 



NAPOLEON'S "BRUTALITY» 77 

with ladies." The fact is, he was very much con- 
vinced that, apart from love or pleasure or sexual 
satisfaction, they count for little or nothing. On 
this head, it is amusing to hear what the pam- 
phleteers had to say about him, the fellows who 
reproach him with his " Moorish manners," who 
describe him as "a tiger in his loves," who attri- 
bute to him "the habits and the brutal instinct of 
that savage beast," and the rest of the crew ! 
"In an age," writes one (Chateaubriand, De 
Buojiaparte et des Boin'bons), " when French 
gallantry softens men's manners and gives urbanity 
to the most savage natures, Buonaparte escaped 
this domination which women know how to win over 
all beings endowed with any touch of sensibility. 
Time has shown us that this harsh restraint did 
not spring from the purity of his morals, but rather 
from a special sort of contemptuous pride that pre- 
vented his paying homage to beauty." And later, 
in conclusion : " Brutal in his manners. Napoleon 
never understood the arts that can blunt the thorns 
of dependence, and even in his pleasures he dis- 
played that cynicism which humiliates others and 
that hardness which betokens egoism." True, but 
was it not Mme de Genlis who warned us long 
ago that " Kings cannot be men of the world " } 
— an unfortunate incapacity that, when love comes 
into question, makes the lover master of his desires 
and sovereign lord of his caprices. It is futile and 



78 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

false and mistaken, Byron's apostrophe to Napoleon 
in Canto m of Childe Harolds Pilgrimage : " Thou 
couldst not govern the least of thy passions ! " 
Softly, softly ! On the contrary, he could subdue 
and master them excellently well. Was it not he 
who, in 1811, told Kurakine : "I govern by 
myself, I govern alone and I am not governed by 
others " ? The same system of policy he applied 
to his love affairs. Speaking to Lord Ebrington, 
who visited him at Elba, the Emperor confesses: 
" I too have had mistresses who loved me fondly ; 
but I have never kept a mistress in chief, and 
never have I allowed myself to be ruled by a 
woman." 

For such a rôle poor Éléonore was disquali- 
fied by nature, nor did her ambitions urge her 
in that direction. A mere instrument of pleasure, 
she was tossed away the instant she ceased to please 
and stir the master's capricious appetite. In her 
case Napoleon's ordinary brutality as a lover took 
the form of a hard indifference ; she was dismissed 
like a soldier drummed out of the service. It is 
Constant who relates how one day, while the Court 
was at Fontainebleau, she presented herself at the 
palace, demanding to be announced. "The 
Emperor was highly displeased at this behaviour, 

and ordered me to go and tell Mademoiselle E 

from him that he forbad her ever to present her- 
self before him without his permission or to remain 



DISILLUSION 79 

a moment longer at Fontainebleau." It was the 
end. The Sultan was weary of the Odalisque. In 
Hict, "the Emperor's liaison with Mademoiselle 
\i did not last long." Long enough, how- 
ever, to give him a child, to embellish his life and 
add a page to his secret history. 

But of the child . . . 

Innocent and peaceful the babe lay nestling in 
the luxurious wrappings of its cradle at the quiet, 
mysterious house in the Rue de la Victoire. From 
afar, from the recesses of the Tuileries, re-echoing 
with trumpet calls, from distant camps scattered 
through conquered Europe, the thoughts of his 
Imperial sire watched over the boy. Two months 
after his birth, he was taken from his mother and 
entrusted, one after the other, to three nurses, the 
first of whom, one Mme Martin, "saved his life 
when in imminent dangfer." A Mme Loir was the 
last of the three. He was brought up under the 
name of Macon, that of a General killed in 1805, says 
Baron Fain, but who really died at Leipzig, where 
he was in command of the garrison, of a putrid 
fever, on October 18, 1806. In the general orders, 
the 26th of the series, of the " Grande Armée," 
Napoleon had devoted a brief and dignified 
eulogium to his memory : " He was a gallant 
soldier and an honourable gentleman. The 
Emperor thought highly of hini and is deeply 



8o AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

grieved at his death." This particular pseudonym 
had been selected for Léon because " Macon left 
nobody to lay claim to his name." If such was 
really the Emperor's idea, he had been misin- 
formed. The Leipzig Commandant did leave 
descendants. On January 3, 1853, we find Mme 
Macon, a niece of the General's, resident in Paris 
at No. 7 Rue Saint-Thomas-d' Enfer, petitioning 
the Minister of War for a copy of the detailed 
reports of her uncle's service. On October 25, 
1876 (she was then living at Montrouge, No 26 
Rue Boulard), she repeated her demand. And 
both of these papers she subscribed Veuve Macon. 
This was the name, then, borne by Léon till the 
day of his emancipation. From that time forth he 
gave it up, and it is by the latter half of his father's 
name that he figures in history. Thus he grew up 
surrounded by the affectionate concern of the 
Imperial family. Caroline had not let the 
Emperor's rupture with Eléonore interfere with her 
interest in the child. It was through her means 
and by her orders that Mme Loir, the nurse, had 
been summoned to the Tuileries. After Revel's 
divorced wife had left her, she had taken Mme 
Michel as reader, and it was M. Michel who wrote 
to Mme Loir : — 

" The Queen of Naples, Madame, commands 
me to ask you to come to-morrow at one o'clock of 
the afternoon with the child and to enter by the 



BARON DE MENEVAL 8i 

garden gate. You will be so good as to wait in 
the silver boudoir. Pray, believe me, etc., 

"I. Michel." 

At that time the boy was nearly four years old. 
The Emperor used often to send for him. "He 
would caress him," writes the valet. Constant, "give 
him a hundred good things to eat, and derive great 
amusement from his vivacity and his repartees, which 
were very witty." But he was far from limiting his 
fatherly care to these trifles. When the lad was si.x, 
he determined to appoint a guardian to look after 
the fortune he proposed to settle on him, which 
demanded such legal guarantee. The question 
was a delicate one. Who indeed was to be 
entrusted with the difficult office, which must be 
purely confidential and yet involved an exceptional 
degree of probity and discretion ? The Emperor 
looked about him, and lighted on Meneval, his 
Secretary. 

Claude-François de Meneval, born at Paris in 
1778, in the first instance secretary and confidential 
adviser of Joseph Bonaparte, had entered while 
still a young man of only twenty-four the private 
service of the First Consul, replacing Bourrienne, 
who was under suspicion of financial jobbery. On 
February 3, 1S06, he had been appointed Secretary 
of the Privy Purse, and on April 13, 18 10, the 
Emperor had created him a Baron. At this date 
he had been three years married, having in 1807 



g 2 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

wedded Aimeé-Virginie-Joséphine de Montvernot. 
Napoleon had specially favoured the alliance, 
paying for the wedding gifts, trousseau and jewellery 
and presenting his Secretary with 50,000 francs, 
"so that" the latter, writing from Fontainebleau 
November 15, 1807, told his wife, "so that I have 
150,000 francs, which I am much at a loss what to 
do with."^ His marriage did not make Meneval 
one whit less assiduous than heretofore in his over- 
whelmine task. He was at work from dawn to 
dark without respite or release. One day, when 
searching for some papers on his Secretary's table, 
the Emperor found an unfinished letter in Meneval's 
hand, running : " For the last thirty-six hours I 
have been unable to escape from the room. ..." 
Turning to Mollien, who was with him. Napoleon 
remarked : " You see he can still find time to write 
billets doux — and he complains of overwork ! " At 
the same time he fully appreciated his merits. He 
was "a veritable treasure," "a quiet, reticent, 
zealous, very silent man," — qualities that drove him 
to confess : "I could not have, and I have never 
had, any secret from Meneval." Meneval shared 

1 Archives de la fa^nille Meneval. In another letter, dated 
Fontainebleau, October 10, 1807, Meneval wrote to his wife: 
"The Emperor has been generous to us beyond words. I can- 
not tell you what interest he has shown, making me tell him 
all the story of our marriage, and how anxious he is to see you, 
dear. The Empress, if I am to believe what they say, would 
like to send for you on the spot." 



M^ 




m 



m 



"^^ 

'^'^Y^ 




i^Mâ:j-.^.^ 



r^^.S^- 












a> 










Dakon Clauul-Francois dl: Meni:\ai.. 
I'roiu a Miniature in the Possession of the de ^^K^"l".VAI. fanulv. 



A GUARDIAN APPOINTED 83 

"the secret of the day," whatever it was. Of 
course he knew, from the first, that connected with 
Leon's birth. Whether on account of his youth or 
because his name would have made the world guess 
the truth, Napoleon finally decided not to select 
him for the office. He discovered a way round the 
difficulty. Meneval had, as we said before, married 
Mile de Montvernot, whose mother had contracted 
a second marriage, after her first husband's death, 
with Joseph- Ignace Mathieu, a member of the 
Electoral College of the Oise, and created 
November 2, 18 10, Baron des Mauvières, with 
right of entail. This was the man appointed. 
Through him, using his Secretary as intermediary, 
the Emperor preserved complete authority over his 
ward and full liberty of action in the management 
of his affairs. He remained master of the situation, 
and, as a matter of fact, under Mauvières' name, he 
arranged matters exactly as he chose. 

Accordingly, on Wednesday, March 25, 181 2, 
the Baron de Mauvières appeared at the Mairie of 
the 2nd Arrondissement, before the Juge de Paix, 
Jean-Thomas Defresne by name, assisted by his 
apparitor Joseph Prague. He stated that a child 
of the male sex, born of a father now absent and 
a certain Ëléonore Denuelle, was at the present 
moment at a boarding-school, where "an unknown 
individual " had hitherto provided for all his needs. 
He had learned that an income was, at an early 



84 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

date, to be settled on the said child. He added 
that the appointment of a guardian was pressing 
"in the mother's absence, and even in view of the 
doubt they were in as to her existence." It is plain 
this declaration was in his mouth only a legal 
quibble, for Éléonore had not disappeared, and it 
was perfectly well known that she was living in 
Paris. Meantime the Juge de Paix asked under 
what title his claim of guardianship was formulated 
by him, Mauvières, he being neither parent nor 
relative nor entrusted with the mother's authority 
to act. He replied that "through various circum- 
stances " he had been called upon to display 
an interest in the child. What circumstances ? 
But there is much to show that in this case 
"a wink was as good as a nod" to the Juge 
de Paix. 

Be this as it may, Mauvières evidently enter- 
tained no doubt as to the result, for he had 
already called together in advance the members of 
the future Family Council, and they had obeyed the 
summons. One fact is worth noting : Meneval's 
father-in-law was living at the time at No. 2)2)7 '^^ 
the Rue Saint-Honore, and of the five persons 
invited by him to attend three were residents of the 
same street, to wit, Frédéric-Pierre Lecordier, 
Mayor of the ist Arrondissement, at No. 327 ; 
Antoine-Louise Gillet, Notary and Member of the 
Electoral College of the Yonne, at No. 340, and 



FAMILY COUNCIL 85 

Charles - Auguste - Bernard Fouquet, retired Ad- 
vocate, at No. 346. These were all therefore near 
neighbours, whose numbers Mauvières completed 
by the addition of Charles - Denis - François 
Bonnomet, member of the Council General of the 
Seine and of the Electoral College of Paris, Adminis- 
trator of Tontine, Notary and Advocate (retired) 
of the Imperial Courts, residing at No. 43 Rue du 
Mont Blanc, and Jean-Baptiste-Louis-Anne-Adrien 
Leroy de Camilly, formerly Councillor at the Court 
of Aids, living at No. 14 Rue de la Madeleine. 
The official posts of some, the special government 
positions of others, enabled Meneval's father-in-law 
to rely on their discretion. They were no mere 
casual assessors. The Juge de Paix accordingly 
authorized them to sit as a Family Council, and 
as had been foreseen, they proceeded to select 
Mauvières as guardian, and Leroy de Camilly as 
deputy-guardian. The Emperor was now in a 
position, with every legal guarantee and every 
precaution to ensure discretion, to make proper 
provision for the boy's future. 

He had been placed at the " Pension Mix," 
which during the Terror had stood in the Rue 
Mcslay, but which under the Consulate had moved 
to the Faubourg du Roule, having as head teacher 
Geoffroy, the celebrated dramatic critic of the 
Journal des Dcbats. In 1S12 it was established 
at Nu. 6 Rue Matignon. Leon left it, later on, for 



86 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

other schools, the "Pension Bourdon" and the 
" Pension Muron." 

While he was receiving the rudiments of an 
education that was of high quality, his father was 
putting his fortune on a firm basis. Between 1812 
and 1815 the Emperor gave him ten shares "to 
bearer " in the stock of the Canals of Orleans and 
the Loing, ten shares of the same kind in the Canal 
du Midi, besides entries in the " Grand Livre," 
bringing in an annual income of 14,600 francs, — in 
all a capital sum of over a million. To the mother 
he had given, over and above sums in cash the total 
of which is unknown, but which were doubtless 
considerable, the hôtel in the Rue de la Victoire, 
and, on February 4, 1808, a dowry of 22,000 francs 
in the form of securities inalienable and unnegoti- 
able. 

The child, born on the margin, so to say, of his 
life, but who gave him his first taste of the joys of 
fatherhood, continued to be the object of his un- 
ceasing care. In 18 14, amid the disasters soon to 
lead to his abdication, he .thinks of him and in- 
creases his fortune by 12,000 francs a year. On 
the morrow of Waterloo, June 25, 18 15, he signs 
at the Elysée a deed of gift of 100,000 francs, and 
an hour after leaves Paris for ever, bound for 
Malmaison, there to decide on his future destinies. 
There Meneval joins him, accompanied by Léon, 
while Mme Walewska wends to the same spot 



AT MALMAISON 87 

with the Emperor's other natural son, the Comte 
Walewski — the two elder brothers of the King of 
Rome. Ah ! at that tragic hour of catastrophe, 
where is the infant born amid the triumphant 
thunder of the cannon of the Invalides, at the 
instant of the Empire's triumphal apogee? In 
far-off Austria the black, two-headed eagles ouard 
that tender, rosy-cheeked hostage, and to console 
the father fallen from his omnipotence, there are in 
the gloomy house at Malmaison, scorched by the 
blazing suns of the hot summertime, only these 
two little bastards, who to-morrow will be doubly 
orphaned. A touching meeting, that must move 
the stoniest heart ! We can picture it all, the green 
and gold salon, with its figures of Victory and its 
tall caryatides, its sumptuous decorations, its 
splendour at once dazzling and dignified, and 
seated in it the Emperor in the dusk of twilight. 
And lo ! there stand the two boys with their long 
curls, scared by the silence and grave looks of 
the sorrowing mother and the speechless Secretary. 
. . . Childish brows, yet innocent and ignorant, 
whereon is laid the last kiss of the fallen 
Emperor. . . . 

Then it is St. Helena, and the long rainy 
evenings at Longwood, The Emperor speaks 
sometimes of his children, the two boys of whom he 
hears no tidings, whose mothers are far away, lost 
to him for ever. According to Viel-Castel, he used 



88 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

at that time to express doubts as to his father- 
hood in Leon's case. " I had many conversations 
about the Emperor with M. de Las Cases," he 
notes under date January 8, 1854. " He told me 
that at St. Helena Napoleon sometimes talked 
to me of his feebleness in love's game ; it was 
nothing much to speak of. He did not look 
upon the Comte Léon as his son ; he attributed 
the child's paternity to Murat." No doubt, as 
was justly observed in the case of Queen Hortense, 
no doubt *' it is not sufficient to establish the 
fact that a woman has seen a man at the time 
of the conception of a child to prove there to 
have been adulterous intercourse between the 
two," and very certainly "there is no woman 
who is not open to calumny " of the sort ; but to 
demonstrate Napoleon's paternity with regard to 
Léon, there is more than supposition to go upon, 
there is the indirect evidence of the Emperor 
himself at St. Helena. Till the day of his death, 
he never ceases to think of the child's welfare, nor 
does he forget him in his " Instructions to my 
Testamentary Executors," where. Article '^']y we 
read — 

" I should not be sorry were little Léon to enter 
the magistracy, if that is to his liking. I wish 
Alexandre Walewski to be drawn to the service of 
France in the army." 

And, while charging his executors to observe 



AT ST. HELENA 89 

the most rigorous discretion as to these disposi- 
tions/ the Emperor bequeathed 300,000 francs to 
Léon, specifically directing that "this sum shall 
be employed to buy him an estate in the same 
year as his (the testator's) death." ^ At the 
period named this legacy could not be given 
effect to in consequence of circumstances detailed 
by General Montholon, June 17, 1848, in a 
deed executed before the Notary Firmin-Virgile 
Tabourier : — 

" The Emperor has, by secret will, which is 
to be communicated only to the parties interested 
and only in so far as it concerns each of them 
severally, bequeathed in favour of M. Léon, ex- 
Comte de Léon,^ a legacy of money to be charge- 
able upon the sums which he claims by his codicils 

^ " Napoleon forbad his testamentary executors to com 
municate to anyone whatsoever this secret codicil of April 24, 
182 1, which contains, together with other dispositions, that 
which concerns you." — Letter of General Bertrand to Comte 
Léon; Paris, May 30, 1833. 

2 A letter of Marchand to Léon confirms the Emperor's 
recommendation with regard to his son : " Monsieur le Comte," 
it runs, " On reaching home, I consulted the instructions dated 
Longwood, April 25, 1821, dictated on the same day by the 
Emperor for the guidance of his testamentary executors. I find, 
as I had the honour to tell you this morning, a wish couched in 
the following terms: 'Art. 37, — "I should not be sorry were 
little Léon to enter the magistracy, if that is to his liking.' 
Believe me, etc., your very humble and very obedient servant, 

" Marchand." 

2 At the Revolution of 1848 Léon gave up his title of Count, 
which he only resumed under the Second Empire. 



90 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

Nos. 4 and 5, under date April 25, 1841, from 
the gratitude and sense of honour (this is the 
actual wording of the codicils) of the Empress and 
of Prince Eugrène. General Montholon declares 
further that the testamentary executors have taken 
conscientiously and legally all possible steps with 
the Empress, Prince Eugène and his successors 
and representatives. They have pushed their 
efforts so far as to obtain from the Tribunal of the 
Seine a judgment of attachment on the proceeds of 
the sale of the Navarre estate ; but the successors 
and representatives of Prince Eugène having dis- 
puted the law as applying to entailed estates, the 
judgment ceased to hold good except for unentailed 
chattels, and during the course of proceedings these 
have disappeared. As for the Empress Marie 
Louise, the testamentary executors have in vain 
employed all legal means and even diplomatic 
pressure. " 

These various documents give the lie to the 
statement made to Viel - Castel by Las Cases. 
They guarantee the Emperor's belief in his pater- 
nity and his loyalty to the fond memories connected 
with it. Indirectly he associated Meneval with the 
matter, dictating, April 15, 182 1, Article 2 of Para- 
graph xxix. of his Will : "I bequeath to the Baron 
Meneval 100,000 francs." Thus, without intending 
it, he confided to posterity the most convincing evi- 
dence of his caprice of the Year xiv, and associated 



A SECRET CODICIL 91 

with its picture of himself the half-obliterated 
image of Eléonore in her young grace and beauty 
— of Eléonore, to whom he dedicated, secretly in 
her son's person, a monument of the tenderest 
recollection. 



CHAPTER IV 

RETURN OF THE "AVENGER OF VIRTUE" 

Revel out of prison — He is arrested a second time — His papers 
impounded — Sent to Tours under Police surveillance — 
Reinstated in the Army — A startling meeting at Besançon 
— Denounced by his mother-in-law — His military misadven- 
tures — Persecutions of the " Corsican " renewed — Events of 
1 8 14 — Revel a prisoner of war in Russia — Returns to Paris 
— A loyal servant of the Bourbons — Éléonore's history — 
Twice re-married — Revel goes to law — His Waterloo — 
Publishes his pamphlet against Napoleon, Murat, and 
Eléonore — More lawsuits — Investigations as to Augier's 
death — Action against the Emperor's son — Revel and 
Leon's guardians — He accepts an allowance — End of a 
good-for-nothing scamp. 

The prison doors were open at last at Dourdan, 
and Revel was a free man again. With the modesty 
that becomes true genius, the scamp made all haste 
to leave the provincial town and return to Paris. 
Indeed, he had two visits of importance to pay. 
During his imprisonment he had indulged in many 
small luxuries paid for out of supplies of money 
contributed by his counsel, Maître Lebon, and his 
wife's avoué, M. Masson. Restored to liberty, he 
found himself very short of pocket-money, and with 



OUT OF PRISON 93 

jaunty step this fine April morning of 1807 he took 
his way to No. 18 Rue Saint- Louis-du-Palais, where 
Maître Lebon resided. But that worthy advocate 
had for the moment other cHents to defend and 
other cases to attend to. He referred him to his 
son-in-law, M. Masson, who likewise turned a deaf 
ear to the applicant. Êléonore had given no direc- 
tions about supporting this scoundrel who had once 
been her husband. Plowever, failing cash down, 
Revel got a piece of advice from M. Masson that 
struck him as excellent. Mme Murat had displayed 
an interest in his affairs ; then why not go to her 
and appeal to her protection and assistance ? A 
noble notion ! Revel flew ( I speak figuratively, of 
course) on this new errand, but only to knock up 
against M. de Longchamp, Caroline's confidential 
secretary, who told him point-blank that the Princess 
did not wish to have anything more to do with him. 
Revel found himself pulled up short and pretty well 
without refuQe or resources. 

But meantime the police — that vigilant and 
well-meaning force — was watching over his des- 
tinies. One mornino" — it was in the first week of 

o 

his coming to Paris — one of its emissaries in the 
shape of an Officier de Paix appeared at his lodging, 
notifying him very courteously of the fact that His 
Excellency the Prefect of Police had all of a sudden 
conceived a strong desire to make the acquaintance 
of the Citoyen Revel. I cannot say whether Revel 



94 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

deemed this a flattering invitation or not, but there 
was no refusing it ; he proceeded to the Prefecture, 
where he was there and then confronted with Veyrat, 
M. Pierre- Hugues Veyrat, to give him his full name 
and title. 

This gentleman was a Swiss, from Geneva, 
where he was born in 1756. His talents, in the 
uneventful days before the Revolution, had been 
directed to the peaceful avocations of business ; he 
dealt in clocks and watches, even doing a little 
in the jewellery line. But the Revolution, which 
among nations bordering on France inflamed the 
spirit of liberty and led their populations to seek 
emancipation, had resulted, in Veyrat's case, in 
developing an irresistible penchant for police work. 
Paris, that blessed land of the police spy, struck 
him as a favourable field for the exercise of this 
ambition. There, in 1795, he began his career as 
a police officer, and soon signalized himself by a 
perfection of cruelty and cunning that could not but 
promise him the most brilliant future. At the time 
of the Emperor's marriage he had conceived a 
famous notion : by his advice, the agents of the 
municipal police force had adopted a uniform — a 
reform that gave us our present agents de ville. I 
cannot say if this was the reason of the favour 
shown him by the Emperor ; but, be the cause 
what it may, the fact remains that by special 
appointment Napoleon created him Inspector of 



POLICE METHODS 95 

the 4th Arrondissement of General Police, including 
Paris. He had, besides, the key of the depot for 
the reception of obscene books seized by the police, 
which enabled him, on occasion, to make roguish 
little presents to his friends, or even to deal for 
money in such-like literature. In tlicse functions 
he was ably assisted by his son Jean -François, 
who served for sixteen years as a police officer and 
Deputy General Inspector. They were, says the 
Chancellor Pasquier, who had to do with them, "a 
pair of the biggest scoundrels that ever came to- 
gether." This will to some extent account for 
Veyrat's having been five times over dismissed the 
Force — and five times reinstated! Perhaps the 
mystery may find its solution in the fact that, by 
the hands of Constant, the Emperor's valet, Vcyrat 
used every day to lay before Napoleon a private 
police report intended to check that supplied by the 
official Head of Police. In one word, so far as one 
can sec, the man was a first-rate police spy now 
retired on his laurels. 

It was into such hands that Revel fell. Civilly 
enough Veyrat informed him that he was under 
orders to search his papers. Whereupon the ex- 
drafjoon was taken back to his lodoinof and there 
compelled to look on while these precious docu- 
ments were ransacked ; then they were tied up in 
a bundle and their owner haled back to the Pre- 
fecture of Police and locked up in the Salle Saint- 



96 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

Martin, as it is called. Doubtless to afford him 
opportunity to refresh his memory, he was left there 
for eleven days of solitary confinement. Eventu- 
ally he was brought before M. Boucheseiche, Chief 
of Division at the Prefecture. The said M. Jean- 
Baptiste Boucheseiche had originally been a priest, 
— and that is possibly why he had turned spy. The 
Revolution had found him a master at the Collège 
de Lisieux and the Terror head of a boarding- 
school in the Place de l'Estrapade. From private 
schoolmaster to journalist had been an easy step ; 
the Citoyen Boucheseiche was now writing for the 
Feuille dtt Sahit Pîtblic. From lo Ventôse to 12 
Germinal, Year 11, discreet, energetic, silent, he 
had been observing public opinion in Paris at the 
charoes of the Minister of the Interior. The 
Directory had recompensed such exceptional talents 
by appointing him Head of the Department of 
Public Morals and Opinion under the Central 
Bureau. The Parisian "ladies of pleasure" were 
under his jurisdiction. Over this gentle flock of 
lost sheep he "exercised his authority with the 
utmost rigour." He was also a prolific author, to 
whom we owe Le Géographe national ou la Finance 
divisée en départements et en districts (Paris, 1790, 
8vo). And, like his estimable colleague M. 
Veyrat, a police spy of the first water. 

M. Boucheseiche received the prisoner pleasantly 
and proposed to go through the papers that had 



RE-ARRESTED 97 

been impounded along with him. When the 
bundle was undone, the first thing they lighted on 
was a MS. entitled Six mois de ma vie oil les 
malheurs d'un choix irréfléchi (Six months of my 
life or the misfortunes of an ill-advised choice). It 
was to all appearance the first sprout of those 
Memoirs of Revel's composition that were to spring 
up with such prodigal abundance from 1814 on- 
wards. M. Boucheseiche took the liberty of read- 
ing the narrative there set out, and complimenting 
its author. Next he proceeded to the examination 
of the shorter pieces, pronouncing on their merits 
as a man of fellow-feeling and literary taste. " M. 
Boucheseiche read out loud," Revel tells us, and 
seeing the officer of justice smile, he thought he 
was disarmed. M. Boucheseiche was too polite 
to destroy this comforting delusion, and presently 
took his leave. It was not, however, to the Pre- 
fecture that Revel was taken back, but to the 
prison of La Force. There he found a large 
company of informers, spies, and secret service 
men ; but keeping himself to himself, as they say, 
he lay low and waited developments. In fact, he 
waited two months. Towards the end of that 
period, in answer to a requisition from some un- 
known quarter, the Police drew up a statement 
justifying his detention in the following terms : 

** He had composed a Memoir in which, amid 
sundry domestic grievances, he had mixed up in a 
7 



98 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

highly improper way the names of Their Imperial 
Highnesses the Grand Duke (Murat) and the 
Grand Duchess de Berg. The man, who is of ill- 
balanced imagination, openly threatened to have 
this objectionable narrative printed. Arrested on 
this last count at Êtampes ^ and transferred to the 
Prefecture of Police, he has been confined at La 
Force till further orders." 

There was no doubting the allegations made in 
this document. Everything points to the con- 
clusion that, with the object of extorting money 
from Eléonore, whom he knew to be now drawing 
an income from the Emperor, even of "black- 
mailing," — oh! naïve simplicity of the soldier 
mind ! — Murat and Caroline, Revel had composed 
these " Six Months of My Life." In tavern talk 
he had doubtless boasted of holding these great 
personages at his mercy if he chose to publish it. 
The words had fallen on attentive ears and had 
been reported at the Prefecture ; there was no 
need henceforth to assume a fresh persecution of 
"Buonaparte's" to account for Revel's re-arrest. 
His threats and indiscretions were justification 
enough. M, Boucheseiche no doubt had smiled 
and complimented him, but none the less was the 
key turned upon the budding scandal-monger. 

After a two months' imprisonment, he was 

^ Nowhere does Revel say a word of his arrest at Etampes. 
On the contrary, he states expressly that it took place in Paris, 



SIX MONTHS OF MT LIFE 99 

visited at La Force by the Inspector of Jails, 
David. Revel was informed that he would be 
restored to liberty on condition of his removing to 
a distance of forty leagues from the capital. That 
was all ! He agreed at once. He was taken back 
again to the Prefecture of Police, and there, he 
says, " I received a compulsory passport for the 
town of Tours." I am afraid M. Revel is again 
romancing. There was nothing "compulsory" 
about his passport, for I read in a police 
memorandum : — 

"The detention he has lately undergone appears 
to have calmed the exuberance of his brain ; he 
urgently petitions for leave to retire to Tours," — 
and noted in the margin of the petition in question, 
the answer : 

" Granted, on the understanding that he sets out 
within twenty-four hours for the town named, where 
he will be subject to the surveillance of the local 
authorities." 

But this "compulsory passport," is it not yet 
another vile token of " Buonaparte's " tyranny ? 
Anyhow, he was a free man — free, above all, to quit 
Paris right away. He began by putting his two 
children to boarding-school, the son and daughter 
by his first wife, and, this fatherly duty done, he set 
off, penniless, on his journey. At his first halting- 
place, Bourg-la- Reine, he secured from the Mayor 
a twenty-four hours' respite, which he took advan- 



loo AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

tage of to dispatch a messenger to the Advocate 
Lebon to crave assistance. He sent him 15 francs, 
a meagre dole ; but another friend having paid for 
his seat in the Orleans diligence, he was enabled to 
reach Tours without further misadventure. 

But how did he propose to live there ? What 
means had he at his disposal ? He has told us 
himself that he passed *'a pleasant enough exist- 
ence " in that place. Yes, but how ? where did the 
money come from for these pleasures ? We must 
hope he did not start afresh there on the old trick 
of acceptances on the back of dubious promissory 
notes. Subsequently we find him confessing : " I 
lived there on the generosity of friends who put in 
my way bits of writing and poetry which I published 
in the Journal of the Department." A droll type 
of literary man ! Well, wonders will never cease ! 
He had realized the miracle of earnino- a livelihood 

o 

by poetry ! The Muses crowned this nursling of 
the tarnished name and fame ! 

But, with a man like Revel, can we be surprised 
at anything ? No indeed, for here is something- 
more wonderful still. A condemned felon, a 
criminal under police surveillance, one who had 
suffered a degrading punishment, who had been 
convicted of theft and roguery, a man of ruined 
reputation and blasted honour, he conceived the 
idea of re-entering the army, and made no bones 
about writing to Clarcke, the Minister of War, to 



AN EMBARRASSING ENCOUNTER loi 

claim payment of arrears of pay and demand a post 
as officer on the strength of a regiment. All this, 
ten months after his liberation from jail ! More 
extraordinary yet than the demand is the Minister's 
reply, — Revel is gazetted Lieutenant in the 64th 
Regiment of the Line in garrison at Besançon ! 
The appointment bears date in March 1808. On 
April 4 Revel asks leave to go and see his children 
in Paris, before setting out to join the colours. But 
Paris is forbidden ground to him, and willy-nilly he 
must start for Besançon, where he arrives at the 
end of April. Here his adventures begin afresh. 

No sooner had Revel donned uniform again and 
reassumed the fine feathers he loved to sport than 
he set off with all haste to explore the town that was 
to be his new home, and very naturally began with 
its places of entertainment. He went to dine at 
the public table of the Hôtel National. A surprise 
awaited him. Denuelle, his wife and their daughter 
Zulma, all the three of them, had taken seats at the 
same board ! As a result of circumstances wherein 
Eleonore's romance with the Emperor appears to 
have played some part, the trio had been banished 
to Besançon, just as Revel had been to Tours. 
Mme Denuelle seemed to bear the stiorna of exile 
marvellously well. A "young beau " who sat near 
her at table was plying the lady with gallant 
conversation. 

For the moment this prevented her observing 



I02 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

her whilom son-in-law, — like the Commendador, 
in this case the Lieutenant, at the feast. Denuelle 
père was the first to try and give the alarm. "He 
tilted his chair backwards in order to give a word of 
warning to his wife, but she, being well used to pay 
no attention to him, went on with the sprightly 
conversation." At last Zulma whispered the dis- 
honoured name in her mother's ear. " A lively red 
dyed Mme la Plaigne's cheeks ; our eyes met, and 
she fainted ; they had to carry her to her room," 
A pretty business ! It was destined to compromise 
Revel's position, and the plot soon thickened. No 
sooner had his erstwhile mother-in-law recovered 
her wits, he says, than "her first care was to write 
to Paris an account of our having met." It is 
opportune to mention that Revel's statements 
frequently excite my scepticism, but in this case I 
pay him the compliment of implicit belief. He has 
not calumniated the lady. There is no doubt she 
wrote to the Minister of General Police, being 
ignorant of Revel's new appointment and supposing 
that he was at Besançon in defiance of the police. 
The Minister took immediate action, charging Jean 
Debry, Préfet of the Doubs, to signify to Revel 
that he must remove to a distance of twenty leagues 
from the place under pain of instant arrest. There- 
upon the newly made Lieutenant arrived at the 
Préfet's in uniform and exhibited his papers, which 
were entirely in order. Debry referred the question 



AT BESANÇON 103 

to the Brigadier-General commanding ad interim 
the 6th Military Division : — 

" His Excellency the Minister of General Police, 
being informed of the presence at this moment at 
Besançon of an individual, Revel by name, notorious 
for his immorality, and giving special reasons for 
requiring his removal from that town, orders me to 
see to his leaving the place at once and to represent 
to him the necessity of his remaining henceforth at 
a distance of at least twenty leagues therefrom, under 
penalty of being arrested forthwith. Accordingly 
I cited the individual in question before me to 
inform him of this order. He duly presented him- 
self, but in the uniform of the 64th Regiment and 
bearing an order from His Excellency the Minister 
of War appointing him Lieutenant in the corps, 
and directing him to present himself here to receive 
recognition as such ; the order is dated March 3 1 
last. This being so, the said Revel is subject to 
your special police jurisdiction, and I am therefore 
unable without your intervention to have the inten- 
tions of the Minister of General Police carried into 
execution. 

" I write you therefore and beg you to allow 
me to call upon you, when needful, to second me in 
doing so, and at the earliest possible date to put me 
in a position to inform His Excellency to that effect. 
It is desirable that this action be taken without 
exciting undue attention, and in such a way that 
till it is effected the said Revel may have no 
opportunity of indulging in any excesses. 

"Jean Debry." 



I04 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

The Officer in Command of the Division thought 
it fitting, in this very special case, to take the orders 
of the Minister of War. He had, moreover, insti- 
tuted inquiries regarding Revel, and the replies 
were not unfavourable. Indeed, how could they 
have been, seeing the ex-dragoon had only been a 
month with the regiment? " I have questioned the 
Major in Command as to this officer," he wrote, 
"who assured me that his conduct since joining 
had been very good ; it even appears that he has 
means and that he takes infinite pains in the per- 
formance of his duties ; nor have I received any 
complaints from other quarters." Wait and see ! 
A few months more and certificates of another sort 
were to swell Revel's " dossier" at the War Minis- 
try. For the moment, in view of the chronic 
tension existing between the two, the Minister of 
War was not sorry to score a point off the Minister 
of General Police. Revel's appointment was con- 
firmed, but on June 21, in order to remove him 
from Besançon, where the Denuelles could only live 
in a state of terror as long as he was in the place, 
he was attached as Lieutenant by exchange to the 
6 1 St Regiment of Infantry, then in barracks at 
Worms. This time there was nothing for it but 
to obey, and Revel proceeded to the banks of the 
Rhine. For a year we hear no word of him ; but 
on March i he thought good to ask for furlough to 
go and see his children at Paris, now living under 



THE "CORSICAN" AGAIN 105 

the roof of a certain M. Bouchet, No. 42 Rue 
Roche-Chouart. His Captain and General Rivaud, 
Commandant of the 26th MiHtary Division, en- 
dorsed his request. For a month no answer is 
received. Then, early in April 1809, General 
Rivaud writes again, pressing the matter, and on 
the loth of that month the Minister replies 
curtly : — 

" General, — I am in receipt of the request 
you have forwarded to me for a month's furlough 
with pay in favour of M. Revel, Lieutenant in the 
6 1 St Regiment of Infantry of the Line, for the 
purpose of going to Paris. I have the honour to 
inform you that the Emperor, to whom this request 
has been submitted, has not deemed it fitting to 
grant this officer the leave he asks. Kindly make 
M. Revel aquainted with this decision." 

The Emperor! . . . The Emperor himself! 
Ha, ha ! so here we have the persecutions of the 
" Corsican " beginning afresh. But lo ! a stinging 
slap in the face for the "tyrant" to digest, — Revel 
is posted Captain, on account of "the regularity of 
my service which gave me a claim to the rank." 
He makes the campaign of 1809, fights at Wagram, 
and sees the eagles victorious beneath the walls of 
Vienna. 

Here Revel found his billet. The Deputy 
Chief of the General Staff, General Vignolles, 
appointed him to carry out the terms of the capitula- 



io6 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

tion of Vienna in so far as concerned the prisoners 
of war. This task completed, General Bron, in 
charge of the cavalry remounts for the Armies of 
Italy and Germany, " asked to have me as aide-de- 
camp." This is Revel's account. As a matter of 
fact, this appointment as aide-de-camp was duly 
signed on May 28, 1809 ; but, on June 23 following, 
General Bron refused to take Revel on his Staff in 
this capacity. There is no disputing the facts ; I 
can quote chapter and verse from Revel's " dossier " 
at the War Office. Then, a few days after this 
rebuff, he was curtly ordered back to his regiment, 
which he rejoins at Penzing, near Schonbrunn. It 
was Fouche's doing, the Minister of General Police, 
— a device for keeping him away from Êléonore, 
now become Mme Saint-Laurent, "that chaste 
better half," and from "her illustrious lover." 

Then more " excursions and alarums ! " In the 
regiment his place had been filled up during his 
absence. It would appear Revel did not enjoy a 
high degree of popularity, for he now begins to 
make admissions to the effect that his messmates, 
the Captains, intrigued against him, that his friends 
betrayed him and his Colonel repudiated him. To 
secure his reinstatement, he had only an order of 
General Bron to rely upon ; they required one 
from the General Staff. After many difficulties and 
much argument pro and con, it came at last, with 
Berthier s signature appended : — 



EXCURSIONS AND ALARUMS ! 107 

" Sir, — You are hereby informed that, by the 
Emperor's orders, you are to rejoin the 6ist 
Regiment to resume your miHtary duties." 

He did so accordingly, and was ordered to 
Worms. On the road, at Mainz, he fell ill. On 
August 18 he petitioned the Minister for a 
fortnight's furlough. On the 29th the Minister 
refused and directed him to repair immediately to 
Worms, which town he was expressly forbidden 
"to leave under any pretext." Thither he pro- 
ceeded and entered hospital, where he composed 
a dozen pages of verse, — Plainte à fart de la 
gzierre, — by way of occupying his leisure. Again, 
October 4, he asks for leave of absence, in the 
name of his children's welfare. Again he is 
refused. Meantime at Worms his life has become 
unbearable. His Major, one Marchai, "a perfect 
rhinoceros," persecutes him savagely. Generals 
and officers are up in arms against him ; not a soul 
but seeks to fix a quarrel on him. Poor, unhappy 
victim ! Anyway, he has got a six months' furlough 
meanwhile ; butlo ! the *' ferocious " Major does not 
see his way to let him reap the benefit of it. Revel 
appeals to the Minister : " I have the honour to 
demand of Your Excellency the right to be heard, 
and personally ... I have revelations to make to 
Your Excellency of importance in the interests of 
the Government." A clever ruse, which Clarcke 
sees through instantly ! These revelations of his 



io8 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

are a dodge to get his travelling expenses paid to 
Paris. Let him stop at Worms. 

Furthermore, for some days now the Minister 
has had in his hand a certain paper incriminating 
the moral character of this indefatigable suitor. 
It is a report wherein Revel is represented as 
over head and ears in debt, having squandered the 
proceeds of the sale of the stock of regimental 
clothing and boots, and which ends by demanding 
Revel's dismissal from the regiment. But the 
Minister is merciful ; he orders the culprit to be 
given a month of prison, to be mulcted in one-fifth 
of his pay and to be sent to join the Army of Spain 
or that of Illyria. The order is dated October 2, 
18 10. On the 30th of the same month comes 
a fresh complaint. Revel's accounts are in con- 
fusion ; he has had deliveries of clothes and boots 
which he fails to account for. But when the order 
of a month's imprisonment reaches Worms, Revel 
is in hospital, down with acute rheumatic pains and 
skin eruptions. There he stays for three months 
and a day, during which period the Major of the 
6ist asked the Minister to hold back his pay for 
him. Cured at last, he declares that he asked for 
his change of regiment and that the Minister 
accordingly transferred him to the 37th of the 
Line. 

But, we have seen, as early as October 2 the 
Minister had directed his transfer to the Spanish 



MONEY DIFFICULTIES 109 

or Illyrian forces. The truth is, there were very- 
urgent reasons necessitating this move. On 
December 14 we find the Major of the 6ist report- 
ing to the Brigadier-General that the total of 
Revel's indebtedness to the regiment came to 
7000 francs. However, instead of joining the army 
in Spain or Illyria, he was sent to Holland to serve 
in the 37th Regiment of the Line on the coasts of 
East Friesland. There he met with a new persecutor 
in the person of his Commanding Officer, Colonel 
Mayot. He does not state very clearly the reasons 
for this state of things, but his " dossier " reveals the 
truth. Once again Revel was in money difficulties 
involving both the military chest and his comrades' 
private purses. He owed, it seems, 48 francs to a 
Captain on the retired list ; his debts soon reached 
a total of 20,000 francs ; for champagne and other 
luxuries he was dipped to the tune of 49 francs, 
50. "You will agree with me, Sir," the Major of 
his battalion wrote to him, "that when a man is in 
debt like you, he ought surely to do without so 
expensive a beverage." In a word, he was raising 
money by every means, fair or foul, and so bringing 
his brother officers into discredit. On August 20, 
181 1, we find the Administrative Council of the 
Regiment petitioning the Minister for his re- 
moval. 

Nevertheless, he stuck on still, — and long 
enough to get the opportunity of having his say to 



no AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

Napoleon himself. For, we may well suppose, this 
gallant soldier was aweary by this time of the 
persecutions dictated by "the Corsican " for his 
undoing. One day it was announced that the 
Emperor would review at Zwolle a portion of the 
Corps d'Armée under Oudinot's command. ** My 
intention was to force Buonaparte to come to a 
definite decision about me. I was resolved to tell 
him, at the head of my Company, that the husband 
of his Mme Saint-Laurent was weary of persecu- 
tion." It would have been an impressive scene ! — 
the outraged husband demanding satisfaction of the 
ravisher ! the Captain of Infantry defying the 
Emperor ! Unfortunately it never went beyond 
the "intention." Napoleon held the review, but 
was in rear of Revel's company. He afterwards 
trotted by the front of the group of officers drawn 
up to salute him, and told them : " I shall see you 
four months hence." 

And that was the end of Revel's tremendous 
project. "This behaviour," he declared, "was of 
course the result of calculation," and he adds, with 
a touch of pride : " It is unparalleled in the case of 
a Monarch towards a simple officer." Then, draw- 
ing himself up, " I was no insignificant figure to 
him ! " Why was he not sacrificed ? " Because 
he feared public opinion." No, truly. Revel was 
"no insignificant figure"; he was a big black- 
guard, and everybody knew it. 




The Emperor Napoleon. 

From a Picture by Delaroche. 



RETIRED FROM THE ARMY m 

Complaints continued to pour in. On May i6, 
1812, the Brigadier-General and the Colonel of the 
37th made another desperate effort to show up his 
incompetence, misconduct, and immorality. Plainly 
the thing could not go on much longer. On May 
23 following he was adjudged a retiring pension on 
the minimum scale according to his rank, and on 
June 18 this allowance was fixed at 600 francs. 
At last he could breathe freely, — and his superiors 
and comrades could do the same ! The black sheep 
was to be lost again in the vast and indistinguish- 
able herd of the general crowd. 

But even now he was not left unnoticed. On 
June 17 we see Clarcke writing to Savory, now 
become Minister of General Police : — 

*' Monsieur le Duc, — Your Excellency's pre- 
decessor has given me to understand that there 
exist special reasons for keeping M. Revel, Captain 
in the 37th Regiment of Infantry of the Line, at 
a distance from Paris and from the residence of the 
Emperor. 

** I have the honour to notify Your Excellency 
that the officer in question, at the present moment 
at the general headquarters of the 2nd Division 
of the Grande Armée at Marienburg, has lately 
been put on half pay by order dated May 23 last. 
I have deemed it my duty to advise Your Excellency, 
in order that M. Revel may be kept under surveill- 
ance when he shall return to France to enjoy his 
pension." 



112 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

Return to France ? clearly that was the summit 
of his wishes. But then, ever since 1807 Paris had 
been taboo. Accordingly he chose Hamburg as 
his place of residence ; a city which, in the event of 
fresh persecutions, would afford " facilities for flight 
to friendly territory," Denmark to wit, or Mecklen- 
burg. It was at Hamburg, then, that the Minister 
advised him his pension would be paid him. 

But in Revel's life it is decreed that everything 
shall be extraordinary. It is an undoubted fact 
that he was retired on May 23, 181 2, and his name 
expunged from the active list of the Army. Yet on 
November 15, 1813, we have him writing from 
Geneva to the Minister of War to ask for promotion, 
and signing himself : "Major in the loist Regiment 
of Infantry, Officer of the Legion of Honour." Yet 
he has declared elsewhere : " I never received either 
cross or promotion to the higher ranks. . . ." 
What are we to think ? Nor is this all ; from 
Toulon, under date May 19, 1814, comes a fresh 
demand for promotion. Is this another Revel ? 
No, for the documents are in the same "dossier," 
and the handwriting is identical. It is a problem 
I have been unable to solve, a question I put 
without the power of answering it. If we are to 
believe his own story, he would seem at Hamburg 
to have opened' an office as legal consultant, which 
quickly became prosperous. " I should have 
obtained my diplomas as an Advocate but for the 



PRISONER OF WAR 113 

Revolution that broke out in the Hanseatic Town." 
This ''revolution" was the recapture of Hamburg 
by the Allies, in spite of Davoust's defence. Its 
effect was to constitute Revel a prisoner of war, 
and as such he was taken to Russia to be interned. 
But his imprisonment was marked by no hard 
features. In a member of the gentry of Courland, 
Herr Konigfels ; in Sivert, Governor of Mittau ; 
in Duhamel, Civil Governor of Livonia, he found 
effective protectors. Nor had he occasion to benefit 
by their kind offices for any length of time. The 
abdication of Napoleon, the return of Louis xviii., 
the signing of Peace, opened the way back to the 
Fatherland. On October 23, 18 14, or else at the 
end of November, — he cannot say precisely which 
himself, — he re-entered France. From " Sarmatian 
lands " the Avenger was returning. His hands 
held the thunderbolts that were to pulverize "the 
Corsican," — the more easily as "the Corsican" 
was now in the Isle of Elba. 

In the first place, he began by asking for employ- 
ment on the active list. He loved his uniform, he 
longed for the splendour of those happy days when 
his soldier's coat had captivated Éléonore's imagina- 
tion. He had every claim, he opined, to be taken 
back into the service, — and, strongest of them, had 
he not been "a victim of Buonaparte's tyranny"? 
Now that the War Office was presided over by 
Dupont, the man of Baylen, the man of the capitu- 



Iî4 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

lation of 1808, what motives could exist to grudge 
his reinstatement, — his, the stalwart of 1805, the 
gallant spendthrift of later days ? So with a bold 
heart he wrote : — 

*• To His Excellency Monseigneur^ le Comte Dupont, 
Minister'- Secretary of State for War. 

" Revel, Jean- Honoré- François, Captain on 
half pay, attests a series of persecutions under the 
now expired régime, and his loyalty and devotion 
to the legitimate Sovereign of France ; and asks 
employment, whether in the active army or in the 
public service. 

" Monseigneur, — An Officer who has cele- 
brated the restoration of the Lily, and who has 
declared himself strongly in favour of the legitimate 
Sovereigns at a time when the aspirations of the 
heart could still be betrayed by Destiny ; an Officer 
who can prove eight years of persecutions under the 
reign of iron that has just expired, cannot but be a 
loyal and devoted subject of the august race of the 
Bourbons. 

" Retired by an act of violence, I should hold 
myself blameworthy if I did not offer to my 
Sovereign both my arm and my heart, which have 
never ceased to belong to him. Your Excellency 
can rely on the sincerity of my zeal, which will 
never relax. Allow me, on these grounds, to im- 
plore you to grant me the decoration of the Legion 
of Honour and permission to serve His Majesty, 
whether in the active army or in the public service, 
wherein I have given proofs of some capacity. 



AN IMPUDENT DEMAND 115 

" I have the honour to be, Monseigneur, with 
the most profound respect, Your Excellency's very 
humble and very obedient servant, 

*• Revel, 

Captain retired on Half Pay. 

" Boulevard de la Magdaleine, No. 17, 
Paris, the 16 November 18 14." 

And this scamp of a fellow, hunted out of every 
regiment in which he had served, concluded his 
impudent and extravagant demand with the follow- 
ing remark : — 

" The state of idleness to which this Officer has 
been condemned, extending from i Nivôse, Year 
XII, down to the year 1808, and the arbitrary acts 
of tyranny he has endured, can only be fully exposed 
in an abstract of service. But the Officer is pre- 
pared to make His Excellency the Minister of War 
acquainted with the cause and effects of the per- 
secutions with which he has been overwhelmed for 
a number of years." 

The Restoration, in the first flush of victory, 
and under pretext of redressing wrongs, was guilty 
of a series of monstrous blunders, — such as the 
appointment of Dupont to the Ministry of War, and 
later on, under Charles x., of Bourmont; but in this 
instance, at any rate, it escaped the shame of decorat- 
ing a thief and reinstating a peculator in the Army. 
Revel's demands remained unsatisfied, and he was 
left with ample leisure on his hands to pursue his 



ii6 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

scheme of vengeance against the two objects of his 
resentment, the Emperor and Éléonore, and to 
convince the traitress that 

Du côté de la barbe est la toute puissafice?- 

But, to begin with, where was Éléonore, what 
had become of her ? Revel has told us she had 
adopted the name of Mme de Saint- Laurent, and, 
he adds, " the notorious and scandalous life of 
Eléonore de La Plaigne needs no demonstration ; 
to pronounce that name suffices to raise a blush." 
Anything else ? Certainly, for he goes on : " The 
history of her boudoir would fill volumes ; but to 
write it, one must have followed the harlot's pro- 
gress, and accompanied her from the palaces of 
kings to the brothel that witnessed her prosti- 
tutions. I leave this glorious task to the matrons 
who were her guides, to the toadies who were her 
instruments, and to the libertines whose idol she 
was." Of these libertines. Revel names one and 
one only, Regnaud de Saint- Jean d'Angély, whom 
he accuses, without more ado, of having enjoyed 
Eléonore's favours more than Napoleon himself. 

Michel- Louis-Etienne Regnaud de Saint- Jean 
d'Angély, formerly Deputy of the Seneschalship 
of Saint-Jean d'Angély in the Constituent As- 
sembly, held a not inconsiderable position under 
the Empire. Created Count on April 24, 1808, 

1 " 'Tis the beard wins the day in the last resort." 



AN EPIGRAM 117 

he was a Minister of State and Privy Secretary 
to the Imperial Family. With one voice the 
pamphleteers, like Revel, charge him with the 
most heinous misdemeanours. One of them de- 
scribes him as "insolent, cowardly, debauched, 
overwhelmed with debt, having sold his wife to 
Prince Kurakine for a necklace." Later on, in 
1 8 14, he was to incur the odium of having run 
away at the first cannon shot fired from the heights 
of Montmartre, which he had sworn to defend ; 
whence the epigram : — 

J'' ai fui, je V avoue a ma honte, 
Le boulet m' a fait friso7tner ; 
Comment veut-on que je V affronte 
Moi qui sîns fait pour le traîner ? ^ 

What Revel relates of him might lead us to 
credit Lewis Goldsmith's^ account, who describes 
him as picking up in his carriage every evening 
"a couple of street walkers, whom he takes home 
with him, tires them out with caresses, and packs 
off next morning." But are these the sort of 
authorities we can trust, — the military blackleg and 
the English Jew ? We know Regnaud de Saint- 
Jean d'Angély was a neighbour of Éléonore's, — 
he lived in the Rue du Mont-Blanc, — but this 

^ " I bolted, I own it to my shame, the round-shot made 
me shudder; why, how should I face it, I who was born to 
wear it at the hulks ? " 

2 Lewis Goldsmith, Histoire secrete du cabinet de Napoleon 
Buonaparte . . ., p. 146. 



ii8 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

hardly suffices to prove an intrigue with her. In 
any case, if it did come to this, the liaison was 
of short duration, for on February 4, 1808, 
Êléonore had remarried, through the intervention, 
it would appear, of the Minister of General Police. 
Her second husband was Pierre-Philippe Augier 
de la Sauzaie, born September 30, 1784, in the 
region of the two Charentes, being the son of 
Philippe Augier de la Sauzaie and Marie-Anne- 
Félicité Hèbre, his wife. The father was in trade 
as a merchant before the Revolution, had been 
elected Deputy of the Tiers État to the Constituent 
Assembly, while the Empire had made him Sous- 
Préfet of Rochefort and Deputy of the Charente- 
Inférieure in the Corps Législatif. The son was 
admitted to the École Militaire on 5 Ventôse, 
Year xii, and had passed out, i Brumaire, Year 
XIII, as Sub- Lieutenant in the 15th Regiment of 
Infantry of the Line, receiving his commission 
as Lieutenant in that regiment by order dated 
September 10, 1807. Such was his status at the 
time of his marriage with Êléonore. The same 
year, without any brilliant achievement to justify 
the distinction, he received the Legion of Honour 
(October i). On July 7, 1808, he was appointed 
Aide-de-Camp to General Reynaud ; on March 22, 
1 810, he joined the Staff of General Cacault in the 
same capacity, and was promoted to the rank of 
Captain in the 7th Cuirassiers. At the time of 



ÉLÉONORE REMARRIED 119 

the Russian Campaign the officials of the War 
Office consulted the Minister as to whether Augier 
should be attached to the Cavalry, the Captain 
signifying that he was not very partial to that arm. 
The Minister made a reply that reads oddly : 
" Post him to the Cavalry, and at once, if no other 
arrangement can be made. Reasons within the 
Minister's knowledge require his not remaining 
longer in Paris. Urgent." 

Had Éléonore perhaps something to do with 
these "reasons," Éléonore who, for marriage settle- 
ment, had received from Napoleon, through Henry, 
Murat's confidential agent, an annuity of 22,000 
francs ? Here, again, is some dark and doubtful 
secret we must be content to note in the absence 
of documents enabling us to unravel it. Anyway 
Augier set off for the Russian Campaign, and was 
never heard of again. Did he perish at the passage 
of the Beresina ? So it was thought, and Éléonore 
shared the belief. She was convinced of the fact, 
so firmly convinced, indeed, that two years after- 
wards she married again, proving the justice of the 
couplet they sing in Scribe and Halévy's play, Le 
Drapier : — 

On retnplace un mari 
Plus aisément qiHun pire I '^ 

Eléonore's third husband was called Charles- 
Auguste-Émile- Louis, Comte de Luxbourg. Born 

1 'Tis easier to replace a husband than a father." 



I20 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

on June 20, 1783, at Zweibriicken (Deux- Ponts), 
he was of a family recently ennobled. His grand- 
father, M. Girtanner, Privy Councillor to the 
Duke of Deux-Ponts, a Swiss by origin, having 
been born in the Canton of Solothurn, had been 
created Baron of Luxbourg in 1769, taking the 
title from the name of the castle he owned on the 
shores of the Bodensee or Lake of Constance. 
His son, Jean-Godefroy, married to a Baroness 
Vogt von Hunolstein, had succeeded him in his 
office of Privy Councillor to the Duke ; but more 
fortunate than the father, he had acquired a 
Count's coronet, September 24, 1790. To come 
to Charles- Auguste-Emile- Louis, after completing 
his law studies at Gottingen and Heidelberg, he 
had chosen diplomacy for his profession, opening 
his career on August 15, 1803, in the modest post 
of Attaché to the Bavarian Legation in Switzer- 
land. This position he held for three years ; after 
which, September 5, 1806, he was appointed, still 
in Switzerland, Secretary of Legation ; on June 5, 

1807, he was transferred to Stuttgart; on June 6, 

1808, to St. Petersburg; on October 10, 181 1, to 
Paris, whence, being relieved of his duties there in 
1 81 3, he went as Bavarian Minister to Cassel at the 
time when Jérôme Napoleon was ruling Westphalia, 
in the fashion we know, from that city. Involved 
in the ruin of the kingdom, he retired into private 
life with an annual pension of 4333 florins. 



COMTE DE LUXBOURG 121 

Where had Luxbourg become acquainted with 
Eleonore ? At Paris during his residence there 
from 181 1 to 181 3 is the most probable supposition. 
Relations of some sort must have existed between 
them sufficient to induce Eleonore to follow him, 
in 1 8 14, to Bavaria. There they were married on 
March 23, not May 25, as Revel states, and as 
a contemporary historian^ repeated after him. 
The marriage ceremony was as odd as the 
marriaore certificate recording- it. It was held at 
Luxbourg's house, in presence of the bridegroom's 
father, Comte Frédéric-Charles de Luxbourg, and 
of a Councillor at the Court of the Rhenish 
Palatinate, named Philip Reinecker. In the 
certificate Eleonore described herself as widow 
of General Augier de la Sauzaie, without further 
particulars. And, without more ado, the pastor 
gave his benediction. Seven months later we see 
Revel arriving in Paris to learn all these new 
developments. 

Having studied law at Hamburg and, as we 
saw, very nearly secured his diplomas as an 
Advocate, he immediately began to contrive means 
of turning Éléonore's situation to legal profit ; and 
after thinking it over for a whole month, he 
initiated, December 3, 1814, an action for nullity 
of divorce, the writ being served on Eleonore by 
Vergne, Apparitor of the Court, in person. In 

1 Frédéric Masson, Napoleon et les Femmes . . ., p. 171. 



122 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

this document Revel appealed against the judg- 
ment of April 29, 1806, sanctioning the divorce, 
■ — and this in the name of the most disinterested 
motives of morality. By the fact of the divorce 
and the subsequent re-marriages of his wife, he 
declared, " Law has been polluted, morality de- 
graded, the guarantees of the family compromised. 
He meant — it was his duty — to avenge the Law, 
to rehabilitate morality, and secure the tottering 
foundations of family life. Briefs, pleadings, 
memoranda, and all other preliminaries he was 
pushing on with feverish energy when, like a 
thunder-clap, came the news of the Emperor's 
landing in the Golfe Juan. What, in such a case, 
was a Royalist bound to do, a good Royalist like 
Revel ? Enlist in the Royal Volunteers, of course. 

This he did, and his son with him, the son of 
whom he wrote from Worms, September 18, 1809, 
to the Minister of War : " His arm shall serve His 
Majesty the instant nature shall give it the needful 
strength." The "ogre," the tyrant who had robbed 
him. Revel, of his wife, was returning. He had 
a daughter ; the calamities of the past had taught 
him prudence. He craved a refuge for her "in 
a religious and cloistered asylum" at the Arch- 
bishop's palace at Rheims. That dignitary did 
not vouchsafe an answer till March 20. 

No sooner was the daughter in a place of safety 
than Revel sped to the Tuileries. Alas! His 



THE HUNDRED DAYS 123 

Bourbon Majesty had decamped on his way to 
Ghent. Ignorant of the route followed by the 
Royal fugitive, the worthy Revel stayed on in 
Paris. " It would be difficult to describe my 
terrors when the blare of trumpets announced the 
triumphant return to the Tuileries of the monster 
who was to bring down so many disasters on 
France." But he promptly decided on his line of 
conduct, and soon plucked up a spirit again. He 
started at once and petitioned Carnot, now ap- 
pointed Minister of the Interior, for a post. He 
had a right to one ! In the Year viii, had he not 
been Secretary General of the Department of 
Saône-et-Loiré ? Men of energy were wanted, 
and why look too closely into their antecedents ? 
How was the "organizer of Victory" — Jacobin 
victories — to know where this Revel sprung from, 
who came to him pleading his fidelity to "the 
glorious monarch," "the great Napoleon," and 
beoorinor for a sheltered corner to save him from 
starvation, a man who had once been a Captain in 
the Army? His petition was granted. Carnot 
sent him to the Eure-et-Loir as Secretary General. 
A few weeks after. Revel was on the road back 
from Chartres, penniless and out of place. 
Napoleon had lost Waterloo ; the ex-dragoon had 
had his Waterloo too, in the shape of the Royal 
rescript of July 24, annulling all appointments of 
functionaries made by the Imperial Government 



124 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

during the Hundred Days. What an undeserved, 
what a cruel blow for so good a Royalist ! It was 
plain Revel found fate as hard a nut to crack as he 
had Éléonore. " Let us pity those whose heart is 
never sated," says an agreeable philosopher ; ^ and 
Revel was surely to be pitied, for again his heart 
began to crave after legal vengeance, again he 
began to employ the ample leisure he now enjoyed 
in preparing for fresh action in the Courts. 

Now he is free, "under a paternal Government," 
and has nothing more to fear either from Veyrat or 
Boucheseiche. For all that, Veyrat had, in 1815, 
been employed in secret service for the Bourbons, 
and in consequence when superseded by Pasquier's 
orders he had been very nearly reinstated by what 
almost amounted to arbitrary violence at the in- 
stigation of the Comte d'Artois. It was only Pas- 
quier's threat of resignation that forced Louis xviii. 
to give way and consent to sacrifice Veyrat, who 
was given his passport and orders to set out that 
very day for his native place, the industrious city 
of Geneva. He left his son Jean-François behind 
at Paris ; but Jean-François was a prudent man, and 
gave up spying for clock-making, a pursuit that 
was destined, in 1827, to win him a medal of merit. 
As for Boucheseiche, he had been cashiered without 
any legal formalities whatever. 

Thus all three "mouchards" had disappeared. 
1 Charles ChinchoUe, Les Phrases courtes, p. 19. 



A SCURRILOUS PAMPHLET 125 

Revel was saved, and he set to work at once. Now 
that Napoleon was on shipboard, bound for St. 
Helena, his confidence returned and he published 
his masterpiece : Bztonaparte and Mttrat, ravisseurs 
dune jeune femme. In this pamphlet, which bristles 
with taunts and insults, he recounted, we have seen 
in what fashion, the story of his marriage, and in 
addition to the torrent of abuse poured on the 
Emperor and Murat, he reserved an ample share of 
the same commodity for his former counsel Lebon, 
for the Avoué Masson, and for Mme Campan. The 
last-named was accused of havinsf had a fine larofe 
slice "of the cake baked for that immoral feast, the 
rape of my wife." At this time of day there was 
no very serious risk in attacking Mme Campan, 
who no longer enjoyed any special favour with the 
Government. Appointed on September 5, 1807, 
Directress of the House of the Legion of Honour, 
established in the Year xiv (9 Frimaire), she had 
lost her post, July 19, 18 14, in virtue of the Royal 
rescript decreeing the reorganization, or more 
strictly speaking the suppression, of the Napoleonic 
foundation. Retiring to Écouen with 60,000 francs 
of debts, Mme Campan had settled down there with 
a backgammon board and a bagatelle table, given 
her by the Empress Joséphine, and a "whirligig," 
a present from Queen Hortense. Flotsam and 
jetsam of better days, quite insufficient to support 
her declining years ! So she was all for regaining 



126 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

official favour. On June 21, 1814, we find her, on 
paper watermarked with the Emperor's portrait and 
the Imperial eagle, declaring how she had never 
asked a favour of Bonaparte. It was he who had 
come to her at Saint-Germain,^ and she had been 
compelled to remove to Écouen to escape ruin. 
Then, she who had been paid by the Emperor and 
placed in a position of confidence, had never ceased 
impressing on her pupils the sad fate of the 
Bourbons ; hence there was not, by her account, a 
house in all France where the king was better loved 
than at Écouen. Louis xviii. rewarded this treason, 
this apostasy, with a pension of 6000 francs, to 
which Queen Hortense added a like sum. Had 
she ever read the letter of June 21, 18 14? 

Anyway, in attacking Mme Campan, Revel was 
by way of confuting Lewis Goldsmith, who asserted 
that Napoleon, "that murderer and debauchee," 
had set up at Écouen " a seminary for girls," though 
after all this was very much in the style of the forger 
of 1805. As was to be expected, his pamphlet 
made a great stir, and at first circulated free and 
unhindered. "It was no doubt from indignation 
against the personages who figured in this loathsome 
intrigue that the Government, as guardian of public 

1 Mme Campari's house is still standing at Saint-Germain, in 
the Rue des Ursulines. Till late years, it continued to be an 
educational establishment, in charge of the Nuns of the Con- 
grégation de Notre-Dame. 



REVEL AT LAW 127 

morals, permitted the publication of this man 
Revel's brochure, which inspired the deepest disgust 
in the minds of honourable men," writes a con- 
temporary/ It may well be that Louis xviii. took 
the same view as Napoleon, who in the course of 
a discussion in the Council of State (16 Pluviôse, 
Year xiii ; Feb. 5, 1805) on the question of police 
supervision of books, had said: "There are ways 
of suppressing a book capable of doing harm, but 
there is no right to do so ; it must be an arbitrary 
act that is terrible to contemplate. It is all very 
well as a matter of administration, but administration 
is not in this case based on law." However, the 
Law was before long to give the Government these 
means. 

Revel had, in fact, resumed his suit for nullity 
of divorce, founding on the plea that, only having 
been condemned to a correctional penalty, the law 
sanctioning divorce on the grounds of a sentence 
involving ignominy was not applicable to his case. 
He alleged that the statutory delays required for 
a decree of divorce had not been observed, and, 
further, that the Éléonore de Plaigne in whose 
favour the divorce had been pronounced and his 
wife, Louise - Catherine - Éléonore Denuelle La 
Plaigne, were not one and the same person. 
These pleas were pitiful enough. Obviously, was 

^ GaUrie historique des contemporains ou nouvelle biographie 
. . . Mons, 1827; tom. iii. p. 125. 



128 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

not the sentence for forgery pronounced by the 
Criminal Court of Versailles one involving igno- 
miny ? As for the question of statutory delays, 
had not Revel himself given up the case by a 
deed, entirely in order, executed before the Notary 
at Dourdan? Then, could any reasonable being 
maintain that the Éléonore of 1806 was not the 
same as the Éléonore of 18 15 ? Nevertheless, that 
personification of unreason, Revel, albeit he had 
" lost in camps the habit of legal studies on which 
I was nourished on leaving school," appeared on 
December 15, 1815, at the bar of the Tribunal of 
First Instance to maintain this paradox. A few 
days before the hearing, Revel had written in the 
following terms to the Minister of War : — 

" To His Excellency Monseigneur le Duc de 
Feltre, Minister of War. 

" Monseigneur, — I have already had the honour 
to inform Your Excellency of the fact that, having 
been made prisoner of war at Hamburg in contra- 
vention of the law of nations, I lost on that occasion 
both my property and my papers. My wife (that 
mistress of Buonaparte against whom I am at law 
before the Tribunal of First Instance of the Seine) 
has reproached me with having been dismissed 
from the 15th Regiment of Dragoons. I require 
to prove the calumny involved in this accusation, 
and I could easily do this were I in possession of 
the papers I lost at Hamburg. I beseech Your 



BÉRANGER 129 

Excellency to forward me duplicates of the records 
of service I have obtained since the Year viii, 
together with a certification that I have never 
suffered dismissal. My case will be argued on 
Friday. I beseech Your Excellency to give orders 
that the duplicates I ask for may be forwarded to 
me with all possible dispatch. 

" Revel, 

" Captain retired on Half Pay. 
" Rue d'Artois, No. 34, Boulevard des Italiens." 

The Minister caused the documents asked for to 
be sent to Revel. ^ 

It was on January 5, 18 16, that M. de Marchangy 
replied for the defence. An adversary worthy of 
his steel, Louis - Antoine - François, known as de 
Marchangy, son of a sheriffs officer at Clamecy, 
was then on the threshold of a career in which 
he was to win conspicuous success. Admitted 
to the Bar in 1802, he had been called in 18 10 
to the Parquet de la Seine in the capacity of 
Deputy Procureur Impérial. He was a man of 
culture who took an interest in literature, — this 
presumably being the reason why he was selected 
to act for the prosecution against Béranger when 
the poet was arraigned, December 8, 1821, for 
stickino- in two lines of asterisks in his sons: 
n Enrhumé — 

^ Archives administratives du ministère de la guerre ; dossier 
Revel 



I30 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

Mais la charte e?icor nous défend, 
Du roi âest Vi77unortel enfant, 

Il Vaime ; on le présume 

* * * * * 

* * * * * 1 

But at any rate M. de Marchangy displayed 
"a great deal of fine feeling and literary taste to 
cover the excessive intolerance of the prosecution." 
He displayed less, the following year, at the trial of 
the four sergeants of La Rochelle, when he made 
his name notorious and execrated for an almost 
ferocious cross-examination. For the rest, he was 
" notable in civil cases for his lucidity of statement, 
his clever marshalling of proofs, his loftiness of 
outlook, and his elegance of diction," and he availed 
himself dexterously of the Revel case to demon- 
strate all this. Since October 15, 181 5, M. de 
Marchangy had been, by Royal rescript of that 
date. Deputy Procureur du Roi of the Tribunal 
of First Instance of the Seine." It was in that 
capacity he spoke, urging the inadmissibility of 
Revel's plea on the points raised. He pointed 
out the weakness of the plaintiff's contentions, 
and ended by demanding the suppression of 

1 " But the Charter still protects us ; 'tis the King's immortal 
infant. He loves it, — it is to be presumed ..." 

2 Gazette officielle, Monday, October 16, 1S15, p. 5 — Born 
in 1772, Marchangy died in 1826, after being successively 
Avocat-Général at the Court of Appeal, Avocat-Général at the 
Court of Cassation, and Deputy representing the Haut-Rhin 
in 1824. 



NONSUITED 131 

Buonaparte et Murât, ravisseurs dune jeu7ie femme 
as a malicious and defamatory libel. The Court 
adopted his conclusions, and, by sentence delivered 
January 12, 18 16, refused Revel's demand, ordered 
the suppression of his pamphlet, and mulcted 
him in costs. The Bourbons were not so 
mean as to play Napoleon the pitiful trick of 
justifying a forger and a scamp whom his wife 
had forsaken. 

But forger or no, forsaken husband or no, he 
did not know when he was beaten. Instantly he 
lodged an appeal against the judgment. In six 
years more we shall see him following up the 
matter with feverish, vicious persistency, carrying 
the case to tribunal after tribunal and hardly de- 
sisting till the very eve of his death. Not till 
1 8 19 did his appeal come before the Superior 
Court, but as early as 181 7 he was busy collect- 
ing fresh facts and bolstering up a bogus charge 
of bigamy against Êléonore. It was indeed a 
happy thought this, a stroke of genius worthy of 
the lowest type of pettifogging attorney. Start- 
ing from the premiss that Êléonores divorce in 
1806 was illegal, he argued that she had been 
guilty of bigamy in marrying Augier de la Sauzaie. 
He went further yet, making out that Augier was 
not really dead, and consequently the third alliance 
with Luxbourg constituted a case of "trigamy." 
In support of this contention he appealed to the 



132 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

Minister of War himself, and it is from his offices 
he asks to be suppHed with proofs. Here is a 
specimen : — 

" To His Excellency the Minister Secretary of State 
of the Departme7it of War. 

" Monseigneur, — I married in the Year xiii a 
certain Mile Louise-Catherine-Êléonore Denuelle, 
known by the further name of La Plaigne. She 
sued for and obtained a divorce from me in 
1806. Subsequently I claimed the nullity of this 
divorce, and the case is now pending before 
the Royal Court of Paris, It is alleged in 
the pleadings that my wife contracted a second 
marriage with a certain M. Augier de la Saussaye, 
formerly Lieutenant of Infantry, and afterwards 
Aide-de-Camp to General Renaud, and said to 
have died in Russia, then subsequently a third 
marriage with a Comte de Luxbourg, a German. 
It is of moment to me to ascertain — imprimis, 
whether His Excellency the Minister of War 
authorized the second of these marriages previously 
to its celebration ; secondly, whether M. Augier 
is dead, what was his rank, where it occurred, 
how caused, on what day and in what year, and 
to this end to secure by Your Excellency's favour 
a certificate affirming or denying the authorization 
of the marriage and a certificate of death in 
proper form, suppose the death to have really 
taken place, — otherwise, a certificate denying the 
said death. — I am, with the most profound respect. 



MORE LEGAL PROCEEDINGS 133 

Monseigneur, Your Excellency's very humble and 
very obedient servant, 

" Revel, 

" Cap t am retired on Half Pay. 

"Rue de Seine, No. 89, 

Paris, December 2,1 1817." 

Complaisantly enough the officials of the War 
Department instituted the inquiries asked by Revel. 
As a result it was found that Augier had not ob- 
tained sanction for his marriage for the very good 
reason that such permissions were only issued sub- 
sequently to June 16, 1808, whereas he was married 
on February 4 preceding ; that he had disappeared 
in the retreat from Russia, and his death had not 
been officially recorded. The following certificate 
was drawn up : — 

"^j)/ order of His Excellency the Minister of War. 

" The Secretary General of the Ministry hereby 
certifies to all whom it may concern that it is shown 
by the muster-rolls preserved in the Registry of 
Cavalry that M. Augier de la Saussaye, Captain, 
Aide-de-Camp to General Cacault, previously Aide- 
de - Camp to General Reynaud, was posted as 
Captain to the ex-seventh Regiment of Cuirassiers ; 
that with his regiment he made the campaign of 
Russia, was taken prisoner of war during the re- 
treat, and has given no news of himself since that 
period. Certifies further, after examination made 
of the registers on the civil side, that this officer 



134 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

did not receive permission to marry subsequently 
to June 1 6, 1808, the earliest date at which such 
permissions were granted by the Minister of War, 
and up to the time of his imprisonment in Russia. 
In confirmation whereof he has delivered the 
present certificate to be available and valid as re- 
quired. Executed at Paris, the 19th January 1818. 

" Allent. 

" Certified correct by the Chief of the First 
Divison : Gentil dAinnone. 

" Cotmtersigned by the Head Clerk : 

Levesque." ^ 

Revel did not stop at these inquiries, but the 

following year, having rediscovered the whereabouts 

of M. Augier senior, he addressed a little catechism 

of questions to that gentleman, as follows : "Is 

M. Pierre-Philippe Augier dead ? By what kind 

of death did he die ? Where ? On what day ? 

At what hour did he expire? In what year did 

this event occur ? " He added the observation : 

" Your honourable character assures me of a frank 

and loyal answer." This he received, and it was 

in accord with his wishes. M. Augier senior, too 

courteous an individual to accuse his daughter-in- 

1 In 18 19 Éléonore caused the same request as Revel to be 
addressed to the Ministry of War, and was informed in reply 
that there was nothing to indicate with certainty that Augier 
had died in Russia, and that in the absence of positive in- 
formation they were unable to deliver her a certificate es- 
tablishing his death. — Archives administratives du ministère 
de la guerre: dossier Augier. 



WAS M. AUGIER DEAD? 135 

law of trigamy, or even merely of bigamy, never- 
theless furnished the ex-dragoon with a telling 
argument in favour of his contention. In Feb- 
ruary 1 8 19 we find him writing to him to this 
effect : — 

" My son may be dead, but I have no sure 
proof of it. Reports, possibly interested reports, 
have reached me to that effect. Other accounts 
dictated by panic are contradictory. The following 
for instance : At the battle of the Beresina, one in 
which the 7th covered itself with glory and broke 
four Russian squares, my son led a squadron ; he 
received a ball in the shoulder and was left for 
dead by his servant, who carried back his breast- 
plate to the regiment and brought in his horses. 
Subsequently some of his comrades in arms saw him 
at Vilna ; one of them. Colonel Bonafous, supped 
with him, and later again, a cook in the regiment 
left him in hospital at Marienburg, stating him 
to be dying, and he, a cuirassier, obliged to make 
off, as the Cossacks were entering the town. What 
can I reasonably conclude on the matter ? I cannot 
say definitely ; the fact is, my heart is not entirely 
closed to the hope he may be living ; I have never 
had a certificate of death, and the Courts have not 
been moved to order an inquisition. Thus my son 
is not reported dead, and I regard him as being still 
the husband of the lady, Louise-Catherine-Éléo- 
nore de La Plaigne, your divorced wife." 

With what orlee Revel must have added this to 
his store of other documents ! What a weighty 



136 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

piece of evidence to produce in his favour ! Alas ! 
it was all in vain ! On June 10, 1819, the Court of 
Paris rejected his appeal. He was not satisfied, 
and carried it to the Court of Cassation ; better 
still, he appealed to the House of Peers, and what 
is bolder still, addressed himself directly to the 
throne, to the King. Nothing availed ; he re- 
mained divorced in spite of himself. Finally he 
resolved to appear at the bar of History, and in 
1822 we find him writing a book, with illustrations : 
Les Mémoires dit Capitaine Revel^ contenant les 
relation historique dzi rapt de son épouse par 
Napoléon Bonaparte ; des persécutions auxqzielles il 
a été en butte sous le gouvernement impérial, et du 
sort bisarre (sic) et inexplicable qiiil a éprouvé deptds 
18 15 jusquà ce jotcr (" Memoirs of Captain 
Revel, containing the authentic history of the 
carrying off of his wife by Napoleon Bonaparte ; of 
the persecutions of which he has been the victim 
under the Imperial Government, and of the extra- 
ordinary and inexplicable treatment he has endured 
from the year 181 5 onwards to the present 
moment "). But this fine and important work never 
saw the light. This is much to be deplored. The 
illustrations promised would alone have been well 
worth seeing. A sad loss, a sad loss ! 

A short time before meeting with his rebuff on 
appeal. Revel had begun a second suit-at-law, this 
time against Eléonore and the Emperor's child, 



REVEL'S MEMOIRS 137 

the boy Léon. On April 9, 1819, he instituted an 
action against the child in disavowal of paternity, 
fearing, he alleged, that the latter, relying on Articles 
3 1 2 and 3 1 5 of the Code, might claim to be declared 
legitimate. But the Law did not authorize an 
action agfainst a minor. So Revel called too-ether 
a Family Council with the object of appointing a 
o^uardian agrainst whom the claim for disavowal 
might lie. On Saturday, April 21, 1819, he cited 
before the Juge de Paix of the 3rd Arrondissement 
his ex-father-in-law Denuelle, who was then lodging 
at No. 6 Rue de la Michodière ; Jean-Simon 
Denuelle, Major of Marines retired ; François- 
Claude Denuelle, a cousin of Éléonore's ; another 
cousin ; Jean- Joseph Giraud, property owner, of 
No. 3 Rue du Cloître-Saint-Merry ; Auguste- 
Roland Drely, property owner, of No. Jt, Rue du 
Mesnil-Montant ; Magloire Le Jeune, employee. 
No. 3 Rue Neuve-des-Petits-Pères ; and one, 
Antoine-Marie Briot, Jurisconsult, who was pre- 
vented from attending. To all these persons the 
Juge de Paix declared he could make nothing of 
the reason for their being called together and, pend- 
ing explanations, postponed the case to August 24, 
when all present were to appear. Then at last an 
agreement was arrived at, and Jean - Simon 
Denuelle was appointed guardian to act as 
defendant in the claim of disavowal brought by 
Revel. 



138 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

It was from a burrow where he had taken earth 
in the slums of the Rue de Cléri (No. 20) that the 
culprit of I S05 directed all these complicated legal 
proceedings. They were very protracted. In 
1 82 1 the case relative to disavowal of paternity was 
not yet decided. Mauvières was still, at that 
period, Leon's guardian. Penniless and at the end 
of his resources, Revel conceived the notion of 
suggesting a compromise. He asked for an allow- 
ance of 3600 francs, to be paid from the minor's 
income, in exchange for the service he rendered 
him in defending his fortune against the greed of 
the Denuelles and Éléonore. In return he was 
ready to promise to drop his suit for disavowal of 
paternity till Leon's coming of age. All these 
transactions were anything but agreeable to 
Mauvières, a man of peaceful habits living in retire- 
ment on his estate in the Valley of Chevreuse. He 
came to terms with Revel, agreeing to pay him an 
allowance of 1200 francs. It was a fatal mistake! 
From that moment he had Revel tuoraing- at his 
door-bell every day, to beg a something on 
account, a trifling advance on his allowance. One 
day it was an advance of 300 francs he demanded, 
and Mauvières refused point-blank. Revel took 
the high hand, refused any reconciliation, and 
began legal proceedings again. All the same he 
lost his case, in virtue of two judgments pronounced 
by the First Chamber of the Tribunal of First 



PECUNIARY STRAITS 139 

Instance of the Seine, on May 21 and August 16, 
1822, respectively. The case cost Leon's guardians 
3273 francs, odd centimes. 

Some months previously Meneval had assumed 
the office. Mauvières, thoroughly sick of his duties 
involving so many annoyances and liable to 
constant "scenes of melodrama" with which 
Ëléonore's mother and her sister Zulma were in 
the habit of regaling him, handed over the business 
to his son-in-law ; to him the guardianship was 
entrusted, before the Juge de Paix of the 2nd 
Arrondissement, by a Family Council consisting of 
Leroy de Camilly, the Comte de Lavalette, Las 
Cases, and the Baron Denon, on October 22, 1821. 

But Revel's suit could still be carried to a 
higher Court. In June 1823, "weary of fruitless 
law proceedings " and sinking deeper and deeper 
" in the slough of destitution in proportion to the 
efforts I made to escape it," he approached 
Meneval offering to abandon definitely his suit 
against Léon in consideration of the renewal of the 
allowance granted him by Mauvières. With blind 
cynicism we find him writing on June 10 : " In 
endowing the child, the Emperor's implied intention 
was that the mother's husband should be supplied 
with daily bread. You are the executor whose 
duty is to fulfil this purpose. Let me appeal to 
your conscience to perform it." He was then 
living at the house of a baker. No. 318 Rue Saint- 



I40 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

Honoré, to whom he owed several quarters' rent, 
a circumstance that rendered his " very pretty 
furniture Hable to seizure at any moment," His 
son, who, after six years' service in the Light 
Cavalry, had become a land-surveyor, was lately 
dead. " There is left me my daughter, a girl of 
interesting personality, solid education, virtuous 
character, esteemed wherever I take up my abode. 
My industry, I may call it prodigious, is baulked 
at every step for lack of funds. I had founded a 
business office at Neuilly ; it was prospering ; it is 
on the road to ruin. . . . Sundry household debts 
are killing me." Of these debts he appended the 
pitiful summary below : — 



Landlord . 


. 600 francs 


Firewood . 


. 100 „ 


Baker 


. 70 ,, 


Butcher . . . 


' 55 M 


Wine 


i6o „ 


Groceries, eatables 


. 90 „ 


Etceteras . 


• 25 „ 


Laundry . . . . 


. 85 „ 




1185 „ 



Meneval took pity on the wretch who had 
fallen so low, and consented to the renewal of the 
allowance. He even paid him a sum of 350 francs 
in consideration of arrears, in receipt of which 
Revel signed a formal engagement to desist from 
all legal molestation. But there, 350 francs was a 
pitiful dole ! He wanted more, and finding it 
impossible to get anything else out of the guardian, 



A "FAITHFUL SERVANT" 141 

he appealed to the Family Council. He petitioned 
for an increased allowance in a letter to Lavalette, 
Las Cases, and Denon, which is by way of being 
a masterpiece : " The manes of the Emperor," he 
wrote, "call for generosity towards me; I have 
faithfully served Napoleon. Despite the domestic 
wrongs I had to reproach him with, my rectitude 
deserved something better than to be forgotten. 
It is yours to help remedy this neglect from which 
I suffer by uniting to give a sufficiency of daily 
bread to an old officer, the father of a family and 
the victim of an injustice over which he has^ 
consented to throw a veil." Ag^ain, addressing- 
M. Lerat de Magnitot, Juge de Paix of the 
2nd Arrondissement, " President of the Council 
of Administration " of the minor Leon's estate, 
we find him writing on June 21 : " Let us be fair. 
I deserve to be listened to. Napoleon committed 
a crime when he laid hands, on my wife. He was 
guilty of a fault when he forgot me at his death. 
It is for his friends to make crood at once the crime 
and the fault." It is the climax ! — Revel complain- 
ing at having been forgotten in Napoleon's will at 
St. Helena ! The peculator in every regiment he 
belonged to, a faithful servant of the Emperor ! 
Yet ten years had not elapsed since a certain letter 
we know of to Dupont, the Minister of War ! 
Men have short memories surely ! For here we 
have Revel beseeching M. Lerat de Magnitot to 



142 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

call together on his own initiative, in a friendly way, 
the Family Council, to induce its members to hold 
" a moral, not written, consultation," guaranteeing 
him the allowance granted by Meneval But 
the consultation was unnecessary. Without its 
guarantee, Revel continued to draw the allowance. 
In 1826 he had been paid out of Leon's incomings 
the sum of 5250 francs. All such sums he accepted 
haughtily ; they were his due as the hero of the 
" cruel adventure wherein at one fell blow my wife 
and my fortune were lost by a stroke of tyranny 
unheard of in history." In spite of everything, we 
see he was still in the fighting mood. 

In 1826 he had another fight. Léon was of 
age and the Family Council preparing to give up 
to him the free disposal of his property. What 
would become of Revel's annuity ? Was it not 
only too likely that the young man against whom 
as a boy he had brought a suit that had stirred up 
endless scandal would let this " faithful servant of 
Napoleon " sink back again into destitution ? But 
his fears were groundless : Léon was generous, 
and raised the allowance accorded his mother's first 
husband to 2400 francs. For another nine years 
Revel enjoyed it, without a qualm of shame, now 
indeed being merely forgotten and despised. He 
still concerned himself with business enterprises of 
a dubious sort, his mind still haunted by that 
smattering of legal knowledge he had advertised 



DEATH 



143 



so noisily, and continued to be mixed up with petty 
and suspicious financial schemes till the day of his 
death. This occurred in 1835. The old good-for- 
nothing was sixty-one. Éléonore could breathe 
freely. 



BOOK II 

COUNT LEON'S TRAGI-COMIG 
HISTORY 



10 



CHAPTER I 

AN EMPEROR'S SON AND A "MAN ABOUT 
TOWN " 

Meneval's " stormy " office — Léon installed in a Paris flat — A 
theatrical incident ; he decamps to join his mother in 
Germany — Some unpubhshed letters from the Emperor's 
Secretary — Léon is given his freedom — His likeness to the 
great Napoleon — A gambler — A brace of sharpers — Hesse 
and the Baron de Rosenberg — Duel with Hesse — A horse- 
man and lover of horses — Lawsuits with horse-dealers and 
jewellers — Léon in a debtors' prison — His " accommo- 
dating " friend Louis Delpech — Plays the French horn at 
Clichy — Léon a convert to mysticism — Coëssin's divine 
and prophetic mission — Léon his disciple — The " Children 
of God " and their work. 

When on October 22, 1821, the Baron de Meneval 
accepted the guardianship of the Comte Léon 
he had Httle inkHng of the long series of annoy- 
ances and vexations this "stormy" office, as Revel 
characterized it, was to bring about his ears. By 
no means the least part of these troubles was 
connected with money, as was inevitable in view of 
the young man's means and his luxurious, pleasure- 
loving tastes. Out of his general income the 
Family Council allowed him 12,000 francs a year 



148 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

for pocket-money. He wanted every penny of it, 
if we are to trust certain accounts preserved 
among Meneval's papers. Thus we find Léon, in 
the month of January 1822, spending 34 francs for 
theatre tickets and hackney-coaches ; on February 8 
he treats himself to 1 5 francs' worth of perfumery ; 
he gives 300 francs for a miniature of the Emperor 
with another 25 francs for a portfolio to put it in. 
To his father's portrait he adds one of his mother, 
the box to hold it costing 6 francs. On Shrove 
Tuesday he hires a horse — 20 francs. He pays 
no little attention to his person : 391 francs to 
B échut and Lafitte, the tailors, and for footgear, 
91 francs to the bootmaker. Then there are little 
presents to his tutor ; for he has a tutor. From 
Rome, where he was in the service of Prince 
Louis Napoleon, — the future Napoleon iii., — 
Meneval had summoned a retired Captain of 
Artillery, Vieillard by name, to instruct Léon in 
the branches of knowledge his rank made it 
incumbent on him to study. 

The pair were installed in a suite of rooms at 
No. 3 Rue de Crébillon, in April 1822. This 
bachelor establishment was organized on a hand- 
some scale. It included silver dishes and silver 
plate from Lemoine, the goldsmith, — 395 francs, 
and crockery from Leplé's, the china shop, — 50 
francs. There were sheets and linen in the presses 
to the tune of 359 francs odd ; for table use there 



LÉON IN CLOVER 149 

were six knives that with the case cost 1 2 francs ; 
for the servants' department Joséphine, the cook, 
had knives and kitchen dishes coming to 4 francs 
10. The wall-papers and hangings accounted for 
76 francs 55 centimes; the heavy furniture for 
570 francs. Captain Vieillard and his pupil slept in 
beds of mahogany and sat in armchairs that had 
been bought for 340 francs ; the muslin window 
curtains cost 18 francs 45 for material added to 72 
francs 35 for Mme Roux' trouble in making up 
and fixing. The miscellaneous furniture of the 
rooms was worth 1920 francs 46, and on the 
chimney-piece stood two alabaster vases and a clock 
valued by M. de Meneval at 210 francs as the 
lowest fiorure. The whole cost was somewhere 
about 4000 francs, including the purchase of a 
Paul et Virginie for 1 2 francs and a copy of the 
Mémorial de Sainte- Hélène — 56 francs and 12 
more for bindingf. 

To a youngster of sixteen it might well seem 
a paradise. But, alas ! there w^as one forbidden 
fruit — his mother. She was far away, in Germany, 
at Mannheim, in the Grand-Duchy of Baden, 
where M. de Luxbourg was managing the Court 
Theatre, and from that distant land this mother 
of his, almost unknown, scarce ever seen, appeared 
to Léon a radiant vision aureoled with all the 
mystery of the unfamiliar. Nor had she forgotten 
her son, her son who was now so wealthy ; and 



I50 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

through one of her confidential agents in Paris, 
a Monsieur Miel, she dangled before his eyes 
the hope of a possible, perhaps a speedy reunion. 
I like to think it was a mother's love that at this 
time stirred Êléonore, now an ageing woman, to 
initiate and pursue these intrigues ; but I note 
the fact that subsequently she did not hesitate to 
borrow considerable sums from him, and con- 
descended to accept as gifts certain pearl necklaces 
of no small value. 

For the present she had so far succeeded as to 
fascinate Léon with the notion of a journey to 
Mannheim. On January ii, 1823, while at the 
Théâtre du Gymnase with his tutor, Léon felt the 
need of refreshment during the interval. He left 
the auditorium, M. Vieillard raising no objection, 
— the less so indeed as the young man had left 
his hat behind on his seat. Then, without exciting 
the smallest suspicion, Léon left the house, found 
Monsieur Miel waiting for him at the exit, and 
sprang into a travelling carriage which drove off 
for Strassburg. His pupil failing to return before 
the end of the play, M. Vieillard grew anxious 
and set out in search of him. In vain he explored 
the theatre, questioned the attendants, and was 
at last forced to go and report the contretemps 
to Meneval. The latter at once communicated with 
the Prefect of Police, who ordered inquiries to be 
instituted. Their only result was that, a week 



A RUN-AWAY 151 

later, Meneval learned the manner of his ward's 
sudden eclipse. The Emperor's erstwhile Secretary- 
did not take the joke in good part, and wrote to 
Eléonore's third husband a letter, very dignified in 
manner and very peremptory in matter, to warn 
him of the course of action he proposed to take in 
the matter : — 

" Monsieur le Comte, — After a week spent 
in a state of painful anxiety, I learn as the result 
of inquiries instituted in consequence of the declara- 
tions I felt it my duty to address to the Prefecture 
of Police and the Head Office of General Police 
that Léon, who had planned and carried out his 
project of flight with consummate artfulness, has 
made for Strassburg, where they are to come from 
Mannheim to fetch him. I will refrain from all 
personal reflexions on the ingratitude and want of 
feeling displayed by the young man in these circum- 
stances, and on the reprehensible behaviour of 
M. Miel whose advice and assistance have once 
more proved so harmful to him. I address myself 
with confidence to you. Sir, because I am persuaded 
that it was without your privity this plan was 
engineered and executed. It is not for me to point 
out to you what you should do. For myself, my 
conduct is marked out unalterably. I know the 
duties my office as guardian imposes on me ; I shall 
fulfil them all, for, heavy as the burden may be 
which I take upon me, I have neither the right nor 
the power to repudiate them. — Accept, Sir, etc. etc. 
"Paris, this \(^th January 1823." 



152 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

Almost at the same hour Êléonore was herself 
engaored on the task of answering^ Meneval. On 
January 20 she was writing to him to explain how 
it was not his guardian Léon was running away 
from, but rather his tutor, who treated him "almost 
like a stranger." Further, she begged M. de 
Meneval to remit her annually 10,000 francs for 
Leon's education, who would be entrusted to 
masters " as well reputed as they were undoubtedly 
distinguished." I do not know what reply was 
made by M. de Meneval to this extraordinary and 
unexpected request, but at Paris he took definite 
and decided steps. Convinced it was useless to 
wait for Leon's return, he dismissed M. Vieillard, 
gave notice to the landlord of the rooms in the Rue 
de Crébillon, and instructed M" Fournel, auctioneer 
and appraiser, to sell the furniture and appointments. 
The sale, April 28, 1823, produced 2644 francs 60, 
less 2)33 francs 50 for expenses, or nett, the sum 
of 231 1 francs 10 centimes. The drawing-room 
furniture, failing to find a purchaser at a higher 
price than 410 francs, was bought in by Meneval, 
who subsequently offered it again for sale, though 
even then it only fetched 412 francs. He finished 
up by disposing of 18 francs' worth of old clothes, 
and all these sums were carried to Leon's general 
account. 

He meantime was still in Germany. Nothing, 
however, is known as to this brief period in his life, 



LETTER FROM HIS GUARDIAN 153 

except that he had thoughts of taking service in the 
army of the Grand Duke of Baden. He wrote 
repeatedly to Meneval on the subject, but the 
latter, justly offended, kept silence till finally a letter 
more pressing than the rest induced him to reply in 
a tone of stern self-restraint : — 

" Paris, yz/;?5 16, 1825. 
" My Friend, — I had made up my mind not to 
answer your letters till you had made good your 
fault. The way in which evil counsels have led you 
to repay my care and solicitude on your behalf, and 
my own self-respect, imposed this obligation on 
me. I will say nothing of the difficulties and 
vexations of all sorts your reckless behaviour has 
involved me in ; in all this I am the only one 
wounded. Now, when you are about to embrace 
a profession, my personal feelings are silenced in 
view of the interests of your future career. I have 
no objection to raise against the course you are 
taking. You will find me well disposed to second 
you by every means which my position as your 
guardian puts in my power. I await the overtures 
you tell me will be made, and hope to learn the 
name of the corps you will join, as also of the 
individual of standing and repute with whom I shall 
come into communication. I am eagerly desirous 
that in the career you are going to adopt, you may 
obtain that success which is only to be won by 
good conduct and praiseworthy sentiments. I beg 
you to accept the renewed assurance of my former 
feelings of regard. Meneval." 



154 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

The overtures Meneval was expecting presently 
reached him from Hennenofer, Major of Cavalry, 
Aide-de-Camp to the Grand Duke of Baden and 
head of the Diplomatic Department. This officer 
wrote begging the erstwhile Privy Secretary for 
information regarding the civil status and fortune of 
his ward. This information was at once supplied 
him by M. de Meneval : — 

" Paris, /«/v 29, 1825. 

" Sir, — I am in receipt of the letter, dated from 
Carlsruhe the nth of this month, which you have 
done me the honour to write. . . . Let me thank 
you on my own account for the interest and good- 
will you are kind enough to take in my ward, for, 
no matter what dissatisfaction he may have caused 
me, the impression so left on my mind shall in no 
wise affect my conduct towards him. More dis- 
interested considerations and motives coming from 
a feeling you will appreciate, shall be the compass 
to guide my course. To arrive at the object I wish 
to see attained, a wish I believe you share with me, 
you rightly deem it needful that Leon's position be 
made clear and the circumstances of his birth, 
fortune, and name be legally established. 

" To reach this end with regard to his personal 
circumstances, there is nothing to show these save 
the birth certificate which I have the honour to 
communicate to you. For those of his property, 
this consists : i. of 10 inconvertible shares in the 
Canal du Midi and 10 similar shares in the Canal 
of Orleans and the Loing. The interest on these 



THE PRODIGAL RETURNS 155 

20 shares, purchased in March 181 2 for the sum of 
240,000 francs, entrusted at that date to his 
guardian for investment, was originally 12,000 
francs a year. Since the Peace this yield has 
largely improved ; 2. of securities producing 13,000 
francs at 5 per cent, inscribed in the Great Book 
of the Public Debt of France, which were bought 
with the proceeds of economies saved out of his 
income after the expenses of his education and 
maintenance had been met. Such is the exact 
state of Leon's property, as I write to you 
to-day. Such are, in brief, the documents in 
existence to clear up the questions asked in your 
letter. I do not hesitate to give them you, Sir, in 
view of the confidence your character inspires me 
with and the part you are kindly willing to take in 
this matter. I hope they may serve to confirm 
your judgment and give you the needful information 
to secure Leon's interests. 

"Congratulating myself on the relations I may 
have the opportunity of entering into with you, 
I beg you to accept my assurances, etc. etc. — Your 
very humble and very obedient servant, 

"Meneval." 

Was this information considered insufficient? 
Was Leon's fortune thought too small ? Did 
Léon himself change his mind ? Did the glamour 
of Paris reassert its sway over his imagination ? 
All these are possible explanations, but the fact is 
certain, — early in the year 1826 he was back again 
in Paris, where he took up his abode in the 



156 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

Rue de la Paix. Meneval seized the opportunity 
to put an end to a state of things which was 
beginning to weigh heavy on him. He was Hving 
in retirement and getting an old man, and for five 
years past his guardianship had exposed him to 
repeated legal attacks and a thousand annoyances, 
what with Revel, again on the war-path, and what 
with Léon, impatient to shake off the necessary 
and salutary yoke under which he fretted. On 
February 2, 1826, the Family Council met and 
decided to give Léon his freedom, A few days 
after, on February 26, Meneval, in presence of the 
Notary Outrebon, gave Léon an account of his 
stewardship, the statement showing 142,952 francs 
75 of incomings and 137,478 francs 44 centimes 
of expenses. The balance of 4474 francs 31 
centimes was paid over on the spot to Léon, who 
gave his guardian a receipt for the amount. 
Alexandre- H enry Fournel senior, retired auctioneer 
and appraiser, residing at No. 18 Rue des Fossés- 
Saint-Germain-l'Auxerrois, was appointed trustee 
and undertook the liquidation of the estate. 

Henceforth Léon was his own master. He 
was twenty years of age, and the glamour of an 
illustrious origin was further increased by a 
striking resemblance to the great Emperor. " Tall, 
five feet six at least, an upright, handsome figure 
of a man," he was the living image, restored 
to life younger and more refined, of him who 




J /' 



Count Léon. 

From a rare Lithograph. 



A STRIKING RESEMBLANCE 157 

had lately vanished beneath the tropical horizon 
of St. Helena. " His origin was stamped upon 
his face, he was physically the living portrait 
of the great captain," we are told by an English 
observer.^ Everybody noticed it, and he always 
commanded a large amount of flattering interest. 
In 1834 he told his uncle, King Joseph Bonaparte, 
that he possessed "a trifling popularity which I 
owe to a glorious resemblance." And Joseph 
himself assured Meneval : " He shows a likeness 
with the Emperor's features." Baron Fain, 
formerly one of Napoleon's Secretaries, had been 
struck by it when he met him, in 1822, at Meneval's 
house : "I could not describe," he said, relating 
the incident, "how moved I was when I saw re- 
vived in the boy's features, the young General, 
Bonaparte himself, the same, very nearly, as I had 
seen him for the first time in 1796, presenting him- 
self before the Staff in the Rue des Capucines to 
take over the command of the Army of the 
Interior." On this point contemporary evidence is 
not lacking to supplement and corroborate the fact. 
One of his friends allows that he was *' one of the 
men who were most like Napoleon i." At the 
same date another remarks that "his features, 
especially when seen in profile, offer a striking 
resemblance with those of the Emperor Napoleon." 

^ Le Petit Homme Rouge, T/ie Court of the Tuileries, 1852- 
1870 . . . London, 1907, 8vo, p. 180. 



158 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

Nor did the likeness grow less as he advanced in 
years : "He was as it were a living photograph of 
Napoleon exaggerated by enlargement. It might 
be said of him, and it was said everywhere, that he 
showed his birth certificate in his face. He pre- 
served the resemblance to the end, and one who saw 
him lying on his bed after death records : ' His like- 
ness to Napoleon, striking before, was yet further 
accentuated. His shaven face exactly recalled the 
well-known effigy of the Emperor.' " It was only, 
be it said, on the physical side that this likeness to 
an illustrious father existed. 

At twenty-five, and now launched in Society, 
master of his fortune and possessor of a large 
income, Léon began to be a conspicuous figure as a 
man of pleasure. He was the prey of parasites and 
gamblers, an intrepid plunger himself, though 
sometimes a bad payer. Of his escapades some 
are still remembered, so notorious were they — 
notably his affair with Captain Hesse. This 
Captain Hesse had led an adventurous life. Son 
of a Prussian business man, grown rich as a con- 
tractor for clothing to the Russian army, he had 
been brought up in England under the care of the 
Margravine of Anspach. Meantime his father, 
who had set up as a banker at Berlin, was ruined 
by Napoleon's campaigns against Prussia. Young 
Hesse joined a regiment of English dragoon guards, 
being a special protégé of the Duchess of York, 



MAN OF PLEASURE 159 

who, as every one knows, was Prussian by birth. 
He was a gay dog, a good shot, a fine horseman, 
easy-mannered, elegant, a man to whom the fair 
sex was far from indifferent. He had an intrigue 
with the Princess Charlotte of Wales and received 
from her letters and portraits which he very 
gallantly sent back when he learned that the 
Princess was going to marry, though this did not 
save him from being packed off to Spain with his 
regiment. On his return he was attached to the 
household of Queen Caroline, which he only left in 
1820. 

In Italy he had made acquaintance with a man 
of his own tastes who was in great demand there, 
especially in 1829 at Florence. This was the 
Baron de Rosenberg. He kept a racing stable 
and was, into the bargain, a reckless gambler. 
It was in consequence of a quarrel at play that 
he killed M. Romanovich in a duel. In the spring 
of 1 83 1 he arrived in Paris and took the first floor 
of the Hôtel Montmorency in the Boulevard Mont- 
martre. "A young she-bear used to prowl up and 
down on his balcony." Fie had the reputation of 
an eccentric. The Baron lived in style, with 
horses, servants, and a mistress, — a famous singer, 
it would appear. His " evenings " were celebrated ; 
" Cardinal " was served to the guests, a compound 
of several sorts of wine with pine-apples, which 
bowled over the most intrepid three-bottle men. 



i6o AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

Needless to say, terrible high play was the rule. 
D'Alton-Shee one night lost 36,000 francs. Félix 
de Lavalette and Léon were the pillars of this hell ; 
the man who kept it, the Baron de Rosenberg, was 
nothing more nor less than a blackleg and a thief. 

Was Hesse partner with him ? I should not 
like to say so for certain, but it is worth noting that 
one evening Léon lost 16,000 francs to Hesse. 
Not having the money on him, he gave his promise 
to pay. Failing to keep it, he had some sharp 
words with Hesse, words that brought the two to 
the Bois de Vincennes to settle their differences on 
the field of honour. For seconds the Englishman 
had one of his Army friends and a German, the 
Comte d'Esterno. Léon appeared on the field 
accompanied by Colonel Fournier and a French 
officer, M. May. General Gourgaud and Larrey, 
formerly Surgeon-in-Chief at the Invalides, went 
with the party. Shots were exchanged at thirty 
paces and Hesse was killed. The affair was 
threshed out, 1832, before the Court of Assize of the 
Seine, although the public authorities had decided 
that the Comte Léon was not liable to prosecution 
on a charge of deliberate manslaughter.^ At the 

^ " Paris, May 15. — The duel will be remembered which took 
place, as the result of a gaming quarrel, between M. Léon, 
natural son of Bonaparte, and M. Hesse, an Englishman, and in 
which the latter was killed. A judicial inquiry was instituted on 
the occurrence of this event, and the Chamber of Prosecutions 
has now sent M. Léon before the Court of Assize, charged with 



DUEL WITH HESSE i6i 

trial General Gourgaud declared it was out of 
respect, for the Emperor's memory that he had 
given his countenance to the prisoner of St. 
Helena's natural son.^ The jury acquitted Léon. 

All the same the Baron de Rosenberg was not 
satisfied by this decision. To get rid of his in- 
debtedness to Hesse, Léon had signed a bill at twelve 
months in Rosenberg's favour. Its liquidation was 
surrounded by quite extraordinary difficulties. 
Hunted down by Rosenberg, Léon appealed to the 
police, who made it their special business to protect 
him. In this he was only following the example 
set a few years before, to the surprise and scandal 
of all the world, by Sir James Crauford, who, on 
being challenged by the Due de Guiche and the 
Comte Grimod d'Orsay, got out of the pickle by 
lodging a complaint against them with the police. 
The final result of all these episodes was that 
Rosenberg left Paris with all his plots blown to the 
winds. Not that Léon profited by the lesson, for 
very shortly after his acquittal by the Court of 

deliberate manslaughter. This decision to send for trial was given 
contrary to the ruling of the public authorities." — Gazette des 
Tribunaux, May 17, 1832. 

^ "In 1833 {sic; correct date is 1832), on the occasion of 
my duel with Captain Hesse, you gave assistance ; subsequently 
you declared before the Court of Assize that you had so given 
me your countenance out of respect for the memory of the 
Emperor." — Letter from the Comte de Léon to General Gour- 
gaud ; Paris, July 23, 1849. — Communication de M. Joarhim 
Kiihn. 

II 



1 62 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

Assize, August 28, 1832, we find him promising his 
uncle, Cardinal Fesch, never again to lose more 
than 45,000 francs at play. He took the same 
opportunity to express his regrets for the death of 
the Due de Reichstadt, "to whom was handed on 
the glorious name of the Emperor Napoleon, my 
father." 

This inveterate gambler was also a brilliant 
horseman and a great lover of horses ; of him Jules 
Janin could not have said that he "wore spurs, 
although he kept a horse." His stable got him into 
many difficulties, and it is in connexion with it that 
Léon shows those symptoms of insane litigious- 
ness he might seem to have inherited from Revel. 
Thus, in June 1834, we see him bringing an action 
before the Tribunal de Commerce against a horse- 
dealer, Letulle junior, from whom he had bought 
two bay horses for 6000 francs. He had paid 
down 2500 francs ready money ; and given as a 
further instalment a very good animal that did not 
suit him. His purchase from Letulle once in his 
stables, he discovered that he had been swindled 
about the goods, protested and then returned the 
two horses to the dealer, who, without any legal 
process, kept the whole lot and refused to make 
any reparation. The Tribunal ordered the parties 
to appear at its sitting on June 24 following. 
Only Letulle put in an appearance, and as a matter 
of course the claim brought against him by "the 



LAWSUITS WITH TRADESMEN 163 

young- Count " was dismissed in default. On 
appeal, they both appeared when the case was 
re-heard on July 9. Léon spoke and was listened 
to "with lively interest." Letulle pleaded, and 
"smiles of incredulity more than once greeted his 
statement." His contention was that Léon had 
sent him back the horses to sell. The Tribunal 
postponed the delivery of its decision for a fort- 
night ; then, on July 22, annulled the bargain and 
adjudged Letulle to return his customer 1700 francs 
in coin of the realm, together with the horse given 
in exchange, or its value, assessed at 3500 francs. 
But in Leon's law experiences it is not always 
horses that are the casus belli, it is sometimes 
pictures. One, valued at 6000 francs, had been 
entrusted by Léon to a certain M. Dubois for him 
to dispose of. He received on account a bill for 
3000 francs. The picture having disappeared, 
Léon saw no prospect of anything more beyond the 
said bill, which had been endorsed as third party 
by a jeweller, M. Fade. On June 2 he was 
adjudged to reimburse the latter ; but instantly he 
turned the tables upon M. Fade, counterclaiming 
on a ring and two studs, bought for 1800 francs, 
and weighing less than the weight set out in the 
invoice. It was a seal-ring in gold enamel, and the 
studs were set with diamonds. Really, to see Léon 
changing about like this from defendant to plaintiff, 
from claimant to appellant, one cannot help asking 



1 64 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

oneself if this is not a belated chapter of Revel's 
life-history that has now to be written. The whole 
thing, in any case, is obscure to the last degree, full 
of complications, crammed with incidents, bristling 
with confused and confusing" explanations. 

The end of it all was to land Léon, by the year 
1838, in the debtors' prison of Clichy. On June 
10, 1826, the city of Paris had purchased for 
399,000 francs two large houses belonging to the 
Baron Saillard in the Rue de Clichy. These 
messuages had been adapted as a place of detention 
for prisoners confined for debt, and embraced two 
hundred cells for men, and eighteen for women. 
Nevertheless the prison used to be occupied by from 
400 to 500 prisoners. Armed with a judgment 
summons, the creditor could have his debtor's person 
seized by one of the seven "guards of trade " Paris 
then possessed, and by depositing 45 francs a month 
for his maintenance, could keep him at Clichy till the 
full and complete payment of the debt to the satisfac- 
tion of the Tribunal. The wiles resorted to by debtors 
to escape the officers are well known ; all the world 
has heard of Balzac's. " What would not a man 
do to steer clear of Clichy ! " exclaimed the bankrupt 
Lamartine. Still it was possible to live there, with 
strict economy of course, on 45 francs, but only by 
clubbing resources. In 1848 or thereabouts the 
prisoners organized themselves in a society of 
mutual benevolence, which, for the payment of a 



A DEBTORS' PRISON 165 

sou a day levied on its members, installed a fuel- 
saving furnace, baths at reduced prices, a billiard- 
table, chess and draught boards, a bowling-green 
and skittle-alley, Villemessant, owner and editor of 
the Figaro, even established a library of books and 
a reading-room there. This paradise of debt dis- 
appeared in i860 on the abolition of arrest for debt. 
Léon entered it for the first time in 1837, ^^ 
the suit of a certain M. Charrier, whom he did not 
even know. Challenged to produce his documents, 
Charrier was found to have no personal interest 
in the debt in connexion with which Léon had 
been incarcerated. Léon accordingly, by order of 
the Court given March -^o, 1838, was set at liberty. 
But he had another creditor on the look-out in the 
person of one Louis Delpech, a financial agent 
whose offices were at No. 9 Boulevard des Capu- 
cines. Léon, who in the early days of his opulence, 
had indulged himself in the imperial luxury of 
bestowing allowances on his grandmother, Mme 
Denuelle, on his aunt, Zulma, Eléonore's sister, 
on Revel, of giving his mother sums of money 
amounting to 25,000 francs, was not long in find- 
ing himself very hard up. Thereupon he opened 
negotiations with Delpech, who undertook to find 
him money, and did actually supply him with some- 
thing like 20,000 to 25,000 francs, an amount sub- 
sequently added to and reaching in 1838 a total of 
40,000 francs. In Leon's eyes Delpech was no 



1 66 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

mere man of business, still less a usurer, he was a 
friend, and what a friend! " Remember, dear boy, 
you are grown very necessary to me," he wrote to 
him ; " when you are not with me, I lose my cheer- 
fulness, I feel a void in my heart. I have grown 
to know your temper, frank and true, brusque and 
impetuous, but so generous and so devoted. ..." 
"You are my father ; I love you as I never loved my 
real father. From on high his eyes follow you. 
You love his son, you render him important services ; 
you cannot but feel in your heart a very noble 
satisfaction." Apparently, Delpech did not find this 
satisfaction altogether satisfying, for he was not long 
in getting into a quarrel with Léon. The latter 
asserts that, while he was confined on the first 
occasion at Clichy, Delpech had laid hands on a 
blank signature of his, Leon's, thanks to which he 
had been able to raise 40,000 francs on his property 
at Mannheim. The story is obscure and difficult 
to verify, as is that of Delpech's dismantling Leon's 
rooms and carrying off pictures, furniture, clothes, 
and papers. All we can be sure of is this, that 
Léon, having prosecuted Delpech, first in the 
Court of Correctional Police, afterwards before the 
Civil Tribunal, for usury, roguery, and abuse of 
confidence, was non-suited in one instance after the 
other, as he was also in a claim of 100,000 francs 
for damages lodged against Delpech on the same 
grounds. 




El.KONOKK IN 1838. 
From a Miniature in the Author's collection. 



A FINANCIAL AGENT 167 

But, pending these various decisions, Delpech 
continued to keep Léon under lock and key at 
Clichy. He does not appear to have lived so very 
dismal a life there. He enjoyed special permission 
to play the French horn. He had differences 
likewise with a certain M. Marcilly, who prosecuted 
him for insulting language. At the sitting of the 
Court when the case was heard, Léon contented 
himself with saying: "The Court will understand 
how painful it is for me to be obliged to come 
before it to answer charges the absurdity of which 
has been proved to you by their mere recapitula- 
tion. Therefore I shall say no more." And 
without his counsel needing to speak at all, he was 
acquitted on the counts alleged by the complainant. 
And so back to Clichy. 

It was during his stay there that, as it happened, 
some curious steps were taken to influence his life. 
On April 22, 1821, Napoleon declared at St. 
Helena: "The family will probably have Popes." 
I cannot say if Monseigneur de Quélen, at one time 
Cardinal Fesch's Secretary, eventually Archbishop 
of Paris, was aware of that observation when he 
went to Clichy to see Léon, but he entertained the 
idea of getting the Emperor's son to take orders 
and pushing his protégé into the College of 
Cardinals. It was to attempt the conversion of a 
very strange sort of neophyte. Monseigneur de 
Quélen did not waste any great amount of sermon- 



i68 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

izing over him, but without intending it, he pre- 
pared Léon, when on October 28, 1839, he finally 
quitted Clichy, with the consent of all his creditors, 
to embrace a very curious type of mysticism. 

In those days the Spirit of God had come down 
to earth in the person of François-Guillaume 
Coëssin, prophet, philosopher, and inventor of the 
lamp with revolving stand, which was manufactured 
at No. 290 Rue Samt-Honoré, facing the Rue des 
Pyramides, near the Church of Saint- Roch, in the 
whilome Hôtel de Montmorency. He had been 
sent to carry out through all the world the great 
work of the famous Theosophist Monfrabœuf de 
Thenorgues, known of all men and in all lands. 
Coming from Montgomery - Saint - Germain, his 
Hierophant Coëssin had in 18 10, at the age of 
thirty-one, founded the maison grise, the Grey 
House, where the young mystic guided adepts to 
the divine heights of Christian perfection. But 
soon his cares were diverted to the " Children of 
God." Everybody knows that the children spoken 
of in the Scriptures, notably in the Second Chapter 
of the Book of Job and in the First Chapter of the 
Gospel of St. John, have been predestined from all 
eternity to accomplish the work of the Lord on the 
earth, and this from the beo^inning;- of the world to 
the consummation of the ages. The prophet 
Coëssin conceived the idea of regulating this work 
and uniting together the Children of God in spiritual 



COËSSIN THE MYSTIC 169 

families. On September 29, 1829, he published the 
first appeal to these children, and the following year 
began the work of God by way of vast agricultural 
operations. Between times, on the death of Pius 
VII., he had canvassed the Chair of St. Peter and 
stood as candidate for the Popedom ; but the 
Sacred College had turned a deaf ear to his 
honeyed speeches. Alas ! that all this fine 
language should be thrown away ! Think of it, 
Coessin Pope ! Under what habit, I wonder, should 
we have seen Léon figuring on his right hand ? 

For Léon, with a fine intrepidity, had declared 
himself Coëssin's fervent disciple. He made his 
acquaintance sometime in 1838 and he was in- 
stantly touched with grace. " Providentially," he 
tells us, " I became acquainted with M. François- 
Guillaume Coessin, the greatest Christian philo- 
sopher of modern times ; I realized all the range of 
those labours for future days that have occupied 
his life, and to them I consecrated what is left of 
mine." Coessin had dazzled him, and had pre- 
dicted to him the Revolution of '48. Léon re- 
corded the fact, after date, with wondering admira- 
tion : " The lofty conversation of this man of 
genius and the perusal of his books left me in no 
doubt as to the events that have lately been 
accomplished and as to the future." What future ? 
H'm ! Coessin was a trifle nebulous about this, and 
then, he died in the flower of his age as a seer, in 



I70 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

1843. He departed in peace concerning the fate 
of his subHme ideas ; Léon undertook the task of 
propagating them. On April 10, 1850, he went to 
Rome to deHver them and his master's appeals to 
Rome at the Monastery of the Holy Apostles, 
while he continued his practical work by opening- 
May 25, 1853, ^^ ^"^ manufactory on the lie 
Saint-Denis. This enterprise of the Children of 
God did not meet with conspicuous success. Then 
in 1857 Léon directed their activity to the deforest- 
ation and oreneral clearing; of all the waste lands of 
France ; but the scheme never went further than 
"good intentions." 

I have been anticipating, — and it is all Coessin's 
fault. Once he enters the Comte Leon's life and 
launches him on the tide of this hazy neo-socialistic 
mysticism, it marks the end of his earlier history, — 
as the man about town of 1825, the elegant wielder 
of the "clouded cane," the boast and glory of the 
jeunesse dorée of the later years of the Restoration. 
Henceforward Léon feels he has a part to play, a 
vocation to fulfil. " I should not be sorry were my 
little Léon to enter the magistracy," his Imperial 
father had said, little thinking or dreaming that of 
these dignitaries of the law "little Léon" would 
only know the judges whose duty it was to commit 
him to Clichy ! 



CHAPTER II 

LÉON AND THE NAPOLEONS 

What was Leon's position in regard to the Imperial family ? — 
An Officer of the National Guard — A suburban squabble — 
The Colonel is jealous of his dignity — Leon's private life in 
1840 — The son of Napoleon as swindler and bully — Two 
very damaging documents — Schedule of debts — Léon goes 
to London to push Coëssin's lamps " with revolving stand " 
— Correspondence between King Joseph and Meneval — 
His uncle refuses to see him — Was Léon in the pay of the 
French police ? — Picks a quarrel with Prince Louis Napoleon 
— Insolent letters — The son of Hortense and the son of 
Napoleon meet on the field of honour — Meeting stopped by 
the police — A public scandal — One of Leon's seconds 
goes mad — Ignored by the Bonaparte family — Léon back 
in France. 

What was Leon's position with regard to the 
Imperial family ? The question merits a close study, 
and fortunately documents are not lacking to enable 
a definite answer to be given. What attitude did 
the Napoleons adopt towards the bastard who in 
1834 was aspiring to represent the dynasty at Paris ? 
Before that date I am bound to admit that Léon 
had not yet made any move, but from that year 
onwards he threw himself into politics with no little 



172 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

energy, starting the campaign with an open letter, 
violently worded, against the Guizot Ministry. 
What had happened ? Something very trifling — 
a squabble with his superiors in the National Guard 
in which he was not allowed to play the hero. But 
it was enough; Louis Philippe's government had 
an enemy the more. The cause was insignificant, 
but as it was sufficient to bring Léon face to face 
with himself and his destinies, it is no doubt as well 
to recount the circumstances in detail. 

In 1834 Léon removed from No. 370 Rue Saint- 
Honoré, where he had been living since 1832, and 
went to live at Saint-Denis, No. 64 Rue de Paris. 
I do not know the reasons for this last of the young 
man's many changes of residence. Naturally at 
Saint-Denis he joined the National Guard, and inas- 
much as, since 1830, he boasted openly of his right 
to be called " the Emperor Napoleon's natural son," 
and as he still possessed some means, he soon 
became something of a personage in the corps. On 
April 20, 1834, being now Major, he took the oath 
of allegiance before the Mayor of Saint-Denis, M. 
Boyé.^ The commander of the "Legion" was 
Colonel Benoist, with whom Léon was very soon 
on terms of some delicacy. At a dinner at which 

^ M. Boyé, appointed Mayor in September 1830, remained 
in office down to 1837. This information, as well as all that 
follows regarding the dispute between Léon and Col. Benoist, 
is taken from the curious collection of papers I owe to M. 
Monin's kindness. 



IN THE NATIONAL GUARD 173 

both were present the Colonel told the Major to 
hold his tongue " in the tone of an Oriental despot," 
— which Léon regarded as the bitterest of insults. 
Within a few weeks of Leon's election hostilities 
broke out. On June 4 Léon wrote to the Mayor 
to ask his authorization to command a detachment 
of 4 1 men selected for the King's personal service at 
the Château de Neuilly. Without referring it to 
the Colonel, the Mayor gave this permission direct 
to the applicant. Accordingly, on June 9 the 
Colonel proceeded to point out to the Mayor that 
an order of October 4, 1832, directed him to corre- 
spond with the Colonel and not with the Major of 
the Corps. Next day M. Boyé replied that, never 
having received the said Ministerial order, he was 
not bound to observe it, at the same time appealing 
to M. Mazères, Sous-Préfet of Saint-Denis. The 
latter spent three days in searching the Journal 
des Gardes Nationales, found the order duly recorded 
therein and invited the Mayor to act accordingly. 

This was only a preliminary skirmish. The real 
battle began on June 23 over a letter of Colonel 
Benoist's suggesting to the Mayor certain modifica- 
tions in a regulation concerning the duties of the 
Guard. On the 25th M. Boyé replied that he could 
not see the use of these alterations, and sent on the 
letter to the Sous-Préfet. The Colonel's retort, 
June 26, was short and sharp, — the Mayor had no 
right to show his letter to the Sous-Préfet ; " I ought 



174 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

further to advise you," he added, " that I have given 
orders to the Commanding Officer (the Comte Léon) 
to correspond on service matters solely with myself, 
as his immediate Superior, and that he should recog- 
nize no other orders but such as emanate from me, 
conformably with Article 87 of the Law of March 22." 
Whereupon the Mayor informed the Sous-Préfet of 
the serious turn taken by the dispute and laid the 
various communications before him. A few days' 
lull followed, but, on July 6, a detachment com- 
manded by the Comte Léon got under arms to 
march to the Château de Neuilly, for duty there, 
without the Mayor having been notified. It was 
in direct violation of Article 7 of the Law of March 
22, 1 83 1. The Mayor lodged a complaint with 
the Sous-Prèfet, who on July 7 invited the 
Colonel to give proper notice in future to the Mayor 
of all such occurrences. 

But then, the next day but one, Léon entered 
the lists in propria persona, asking the Mayor to 
repudiate all and every regulation relative to the 
ordinary duties of the service which had not been 
submitted to him, and this in accordance with the 
terms of the Law of March 22, 1831, Article 78. 
The Mayor communicated this letter, "written in 
the true spirit of the Law," to the Sous-Préfet, with 
the remark that it only served to complicate the dis- 
pute with the Colonel. Other correspondence 
passed, down to July 16, on which date Léon gave 



A VERY PRETTY QUARREL 175 

the Sous-Préfet to understand that he, and he alone, 
was entitled to initiate a regulation. M. Mazères 
and the Colonel regarded the letter as "unseemly," 
and made up their minds to punish its writer. Leon 
was summoned to appear that same day before the 
Council of the Prefecture to submit his explanations. 
The Sous-Préfet demanded two months' suspension, 
and on July 26 the Major was condemned to this 
penalty. 

Instantly Saint-Denis was in an uproar. The 
taverns were boiling with excitement, the drinking- 
shops echoed with shouts of " Long live the Comte 
Léon ; down with Benoist ! " In all quarters mani- 
festations broke out, quite wearing out Prache the 
garde-chainpetre. The very children joined in, firing 
off crackers in the Place d'Armes and uttering 
piercing yells. All this lasted far into the night. 
Saint- Denis felt its usual peacefulness broken by the 
ominous breath of insurrection. The Colonel stuck 
to his guns. On August 19 he had a very strongly 
worded broadsheet against the Mayor distributed, to 
which the Mayor replied in kind ; " M. Boyé, out- 
raged by this abuse and indignant at the false state- 
ments made so confidently, published a refutation 
that covered Colonel Benoist with shame." As 
for Léon he had by July 29 already left Saint- 
Denis. 

It was then he went over to England, where 
Joseph Bonaparte was living in exile. He appeared 



176 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

at his house, and the old King was surprised to see 
him, coming as he did with no letter of introduction 
from Meneval. "He has been with me two days." 
He made a fairly good impression on Joseph, to 
whom he confided the secret that he was o^oin»' to 
make it his business to get the Chambers to repeal 
the law exiling the Bonapartes since 181 5. "He 
possesses a natural eloquence, and he struck me as 
having the love of study," wrote King Joseph to 
his former secretary. He was not destined to 
preserve for any long space of time these consoling 
delusions. 

Before the month was out Léon had returned 
to France and was back at Saint-Denis. The 
period of his suspension was expired, and, on 
September 29, on taking up his duties again, his 
first act was to issue an order of the day protesting 
against his suspension, an "illegal and unjust act," 
and countermanding the service regulation put in 
force during his absence by the Colonel. The thing 
was too scandalous, and the authorities were not 
slow to vindicate discipline. On October 11, 1834, 
he was again suspended for two months, and, October 
28 following, a Royal rescript relieved him of his 
duties altogether. He had hoped as the result of 
his order of the day to be indited before the Court 
of Assize ; but, by what he says, the Government 
recoiled at the thought of bringing to trial "a man 
who is bound by family ties to the Napoleons," 



THE JULY MONARCHY 177 

and preferred to do his business for him behind 
closed doors in the Council of the Prefecture of the 
Seine. Such was Leon's history as an Officer of 
the National Guard. Shall we call it broad farce 
or transpontine melodrama ? ^ 

The part he attributed in this to the Govern- 
ment of Louis Philippe brought him into direct 
conflict with the July Monarchy — at any rate, in 
outward seeming ; for, later on, we shall have to 
examine into certain delicate questions regarding his 
possible relations with the police of this Adminis- 
tration, for which at the present time he proclaimed 
his deepest detestation. For the moment it is at 
the date of his release from Clichy that we must 
take up his history. We have seen how he was 
enlarged on October 23 and restored to the streets 
of Paris without much in the way of means. He 
went to live at No. 35 Rue du Mail at the Hôtel 
de Bruxelles, kept by a man called Fournol. A 
police report, dated January 22, 1840, gives us some 
edifying particulars. We see him living there as 
the lover of a fortune-teller, who keeps him, and 
who had before now come to his financial assistance 
during his confinement at Clichy. It is the first 
step of the descent into that slough of scandal and 

^ On December 27, 1835, ^ ^- Cosnard was elected in 
Leon's place. The latter, however, rejoined the Garde Nationale 
of Saint-Denis. On May 29, 1836, he was elected Sub- 
Lieutenant in the 2nd company of Chasseurs forming part of 
the corps, and, on August 10 following, took oath of allegiance. 



Ï78 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

ill-repute that allies him so closely with Revel. The 
report does not mince words : — 

"The Comte Léon lives at the Hôtel de 
Bruxelles, Rue du Mail. He has for mistress a 
woman of vicious life, living and cohabiting with a 
married man named Lesieur, a clerk at the War 
Office, who has deserted his lawful wife for this 
concubine, who treats him in the most indecent 
fashion. This self-styled Mme Lesieur follows the 
practice of magnetism, the proceeds of which busi 
ness is devoured, as likewise Lesieur's allowance, by 
the Comte Léon ; they live in the Rue du Petit- 
Carreau, 2 1, second floor, 200 francs rent, not 
owning as much as 50 francs' worth of furniture 
and efifects. Everything else has been sold to keep 
Léon in prison. . . . Having nothing more to sell, 
the woman has borrowed loans to pay the expenses 
of a lawsuit Léon is at present engaged in. His 
mistress asserts that he must win it, and that Léon 
will then go at once to see Louis Bonaparte in 
London, and that she will accompany him. At 
the moment the woman is selling some very fine 
napkins marked with the Count's monogram. It 
is said for certain that this woman's furniture and 
clothes are not worth 50 francs. All the tenants of 
the house are indignant at the scandalous behaviour 
of the Comte Léon and the woman." 

Details even more precise and more damaging, 
if possible, are supplied by the man Delpech, the 
financial agent who had had him locked up at 
Clichy. It is in a memorandum of his, dated 



BULLY AND SWINDLER 179 

1840, that they are to be found, and they will 
serve to establish once for all Leon's moral physiog- 
nomy at the period of his release, and his enthusiasm 
for Coessin's doctrines. Well, here is what Del- 
pech writes : — 

"He was born as the accredited son of one 
Revel, husband of Mme Eléonore Laplaigne ; this 
Revel was a Captain of Infantry,'^ condemned to a 
grave penalty by a Court of Law. The Emperor 
had settled on him an income of 40,000 francs in 
canals, minor securities, and 22,000 francs from 
bonds at 5 p.c. in the Public Debt, in which his 
mother is to have a life-interest, and which are to 
revert to him after her death. M. de Meneval, 
who refuses any longer to see him or receive him 
at his house, was his guardian. For a long time 
now he has lived by roguery, residing at No. 39 
Rue Neuve-Saint-Augustin, on the first floor. The 
furniture was attached ; therefore he paid Mme 
Buelle, wife of a magistrate at Corbeil, who 
occupied the mezzanine floor, the compliment of 
proposing to her to exchange rooms, and the furni- 
ture was shifted accordingly. When the officers 
came to execute the seizure on the first floor, they 
found Mme Buelle's furniture there ; the other set 
had vanished conveniently enough to the entresol, 
together with a very handsome lamp of Mme 
Buelle's and some other small articles. In the 

1 We have shown, earUer in the book, that at the time of his 
condemnation Revel was Quartermaster in the 15th Regiment 
of Dragoons, on the retired list. 



i8o AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

same gallant fashion the noble Count had likewise 
tried to lay hands on Mme Buelle's watch and 
diamonds, had she not shouted for help. The 
noble Count suggested to his niece ^ to poison her 
husband, the Comte de Luxbourg ; he threatened 
his niece to murder her unless she gave him money. 
She put herself under protection of the Prefect of 
Police, who directed the Police Commissary Wolff 
to keep an eye on his niece's safety. He cited his 
niece and the Comte de Luxbourg, her husband, 
before the Correctional Police, and accused the 
former of bigamy and trigamy. At Saint-Pélagie 
he was quoted as the worst character in the prison ; 
he cheated all the caterers, stole the Governor's 
watch, raised scandal and disturbance generally. 
He was clapped in a dungeon ; he accused the 
Governor of sleeping with his niece, though he had 
never set eyes on her. I have not before me for 
the moment the memorandum of this brio-and Léon 
Revel's debts, which amount to over 100,000 francs, 
in which total I figure for about 47,000, The 
principal creditors are : — 

M 



about .... 


t lYiiiuiiicaim, 

72,000 francs. 


Touchard, coachbuilder 


5,000 „ 


To Captain Toufay 


4,000 „ 


To Guichard .... 


5,000 „ 


A host of other debts, great and small. 




amongst the rest to a Jew of the Rue 




de Port-Mahon 


18,000 „ 



1 In the margin is a note : " Doubtless there is a mistake 
here, the word niece being used where probably we should read 
mother." No, not probably ; obviously. 



SCHEDULE OF DEBTS i8i 

Mme Maillé, at Montreuil, for board 

and lodging by the week . . 6,000 francs. 
To the chambermaid's husband . 500 „ 
Mme Pierson, for board and lodging . 4,000 , 
To his cook, for provisions . . 200 „ 
Mont de Piété, Rue Bourbon-Ville- 
neuve, 30, swindled recently . . 1,200 „ 

A lonp- strinor of tailors, bootmakers, eatino^- 
house keepers, tradesmen of all sorts and kinds ; 
all the advocates, solicitors, officers of the court, 
to whom he has promised everything and never 
given a crown-piece ; a wine merchant, from whom 
he quite recently bought 12,000 francs' worth of 
wine which he resold for 4 or 5000 francs ; several 
watchmakers, jewellers," etc. 

Such was the Emperor's son when he resolved 
to cultivate more intimate relations with his family. 
On January 30, 1840, owing the landlord 686 
francs, he was turned out of the Hôtel de Bruxelles 
and went to find a home with Coessin. The 
prophet welcomed the neophyte and initiated him 
into the secret of the lamp with revolving stand. 
At that very time, in London, a Mr. Parker was 
disposed to take up the enterprise for England. 
Léon thought this fitted in admirably, as he had 
conceived the project of going to see his uncles 
Joseph and Jérôme to ask them for a trifle, — 
500,000 francs. Madame Mère and Cardinal 
Fesch had, he declares, bequeathed him that sum 
on condition that he took orders. Yet he could not 
but be aware that the Cardinal had made Joseph 



1 82 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

his universal legatee, and that all the other would- 
be beneficiaries were bound to be disappointed in 
their expectations if they claimed the partition of 
the estate. But with Léon incoherences eo for 
nothing. As for Madame Mère, to whom the 
Baron de Meneval had recommended him in 1826, 
she had made no special provision for this grand- 
son. To make sure of the fact, and also to push the 
lamps with revolving stand, he set out on February 
12 for London, accompanied by Martial Kien, a 
friend of Coëssin's, and provided with 300 francs 
lent by M. Alexandre Contzen, of No. 41 Rue 
Neuve-Saint-Augustin. He put up in London at 
Fenton's Hotel, — the same where, after leaving 
Switzerland in 1838, his cousin Louis Napoleon 
had taken up his residence. On this occasion 
King Joseph was advised beforehand of his 
nephew's visit by Meneval, who, February 5, wrote 
to him from Paris : — 

" Léon is going to London, and asks me to 
give him a letter for you. I do so the more will- 
ingly as it affords me an opportunity of recalling 
myself to your memory and of learning news of 
you from an eye-witness. He has known reverses 
of fortune, the details of which I only know imper- 
fectly ; if you deign to hear what he has to say, 
he will tell you the facts himself. They have been 
caused by the independent attitude he has chosen 
to assume towards the advice of those who wish 
him well, and from his own inexperience. He 



LÉON IN LONDON 183 

appears to have many schemes in hand and to 
overestimate his resources, as also the value of a 
supposed protection exercised on his behalf by the 
late Archbishop of Paris with Cardinal Fesch. He 
is a man of enterprising temper, whom prudence 
and a spirit of rectitude do not always govern. 
He talks of going to Petersburg to seek payment 
from the Due de Leuchtenberg of the legacy left 
him by the Emperor from funds remaining in the 
hands of Prince Eugène. He is similarly in dis- 
pute with his mother, who wishes to deal with stock 
to the amount of 20,000 francs a year in the Public 
Debt, which she owes to the Emperor's generosity, 
and the reversion of which naturally comes to 
Léon. The Emperor had also left him 300,000 
francs in Assignments on the fellings of the 
Imperial Forests, which have been invalidated by 
a rescript of Louis xviii,, and on which there is no 
hope of recovering anything. This is a brief ex- 
position of his financial position. I refrain from 
recommending him to your good favour, for it 
would be better he should show himself a little 
more worthy of winning it himself. Under any 
circumstances, the interest that attaches to his 
birth, in some sort acknowledged by the Emperor, 
and the affection he bore him, cannot be 
forgotten." 

Joseph doubtless asked nothing better ; but 
Léon had already thought fit to make remarks to 
Dr. O'Meara which, being repeated to Joseph, 
decided him not to receive his brother's illegitimate 



1 84 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

son. He advised Meneval at once of this deter- 
mination : — 

"London, February 15, 1840. 
" It was only to-day I received your letter of 
the 5th. You will find below a copy of the letter 
I have written in reply, and which is to be 
handed, sealed without being fastened down, to your 
ward^ by my hall-porter. If ever we meet again, 
I will show you the letter from our good friend 
O'Meara, and you will understand that I was 
bound to end the matter as I do by this letter. 
Believe me your old friend, now as always — Yours 
affectionately, Joseph." 

Accordingly, Léon left his card at his uncle's 
residence in Cavendish Square and requested an 
interview, only to find, on coming again, the follow- 
ing letter addressed to Meneval : — 

" Monsieur le Baron, — Your letter of the 5th 
only reached me to-day. I am greatly grieved to 
have to refuse you anything, my dear Monsieur 
Meneval, whom I have loved like a son ever since 
I have known you. But the observations your 
ward has indulged in to M. le Docteur O'Meara, 
who felt bound to communicate the same to me, 
are of such a nature as to have broken off all 
relations between us. I desire his happiness, but I 
will never have anything more to do with him, and 
I wish him to forget me as I shall be consulting my 

^ His Majesty in the original misspells fupile for pupille 
(ward). 



A REBUFF 185 

own happiness in forgetting him, for you know, 
my dear Meneval, that my heart finds no satisfac- 
tion in gall and bitterness. 

" I realise how much stronger circumstances are 
than men, and I appreciate all the disinterestedness 
of your efforts to help, so far as lies in your power, 
your old friends. Remember you are the oldest, 
and I hail with pleasure the present opportunity of 
once more assuring you of the fact. J." 

" All the members of the Imperial family have 
loaded the Comte Léon with tokens of interest 
and affection," so said an Advocate pleading for 
Léon in 1846. We see that, as long ago as 1840, 
the Count was doing his best to alienate these 
favourable dispositions and put an end to any such 
"tokens of interest." His uncle Lucien was the 
only one who welcomed him to London with kind- 
ness. What of the others ? . . . What harm had 
Léon done them ? What grievance did they allege 
against him ? Without insisting further, he has 
said himself that, even before he had set foot in 
England, " calumny had forestalled me in that 
country." ' What calumny? He was accused, 
nothing more nor less, of being a police spy in the 
pay of Louis Philippe's Government. Fully to 
understand the special gravity of this suspicion, we 
must remember that for two years past Prince 
Louis Napoleon, son of King Louis and Queen 
Hortense, the conspirator of Strassburg, had been 



1 86 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

a refugee in England, having fled thither after 
France had threatened to declare war on Switzer- 
land if she did not expel him from the territory 
of the Helvetic Confederation. But in London, 
under the aegis of British hospitality, freely and 
generously extended without check as without con- 
ditions, the Prince constituted a danger for the 
French Government far more serious than he had 
in Switzerland, where his works and ways could 
easily be watched, if not checkmated. England 
was different. Accordingly the French Ministry 
made a point of dispatching to London a succes- 
sion of secret agents, informers, police spies. I 
will relate some day how they sent General de 
Montholon, the man of St. Helena and of the 
affair of the Rue des Prouvaires, on the same 
business. 

Did the Comte Léon receive, and did he 
undertake, a commission of the sort? It is 
common knowledge how difficult it is to get proof 
positive in affairs of this kind ; I merely note that 
at the time it was a belief blindly accepted by 
almost everybody. " Under the government 
lately fallen," Léon wrote, speaking of the July 
Monarchy, " I never chose to accept anything ; its 
corrupt and corrupting system shocked me." Ex- 
cellent ; only it will be noticed that Léon had set 
out for London with a letter from the Comte Mole 
in his pocket, which letter was to give him the 



WAS HE A PAID SPY? 187 

entrée into the best English Society, a fact ad- 
mitted by one of his counsel in 1846. Another 
queer thing was commented on, — the Comte Léon 
had just come out of a debtors' prison, yet when he 
arrived in London he put up at a sumptuous hotel, 
where he gave luxurious dinners and cut a dash 
generally. 

More than that, there appeared a paragraph 
soon afterwards in the Argiis, an English journal, 
to this effect : " Prince Louis received several 
letters from the French capital in which he was 
informed that a plot was hatching against his life ; 
at the same time he was warned that Count Léon 
was selected to go to England and challenge him 
to mortal combat. Within a short time the 
Count's debts were paid, he was provided with 
a passport, and he duly proceeded to London." 
A famous Englishman, Lord Malmesbury, noted 
at the same period that Léon had been sent to 
London " by the French police to kill the Prince 
Louis Napoleon or get him expelled the king- 
dom as having" infringed its laws on duellinor." 
Meantime, in Paris, in its issues of March 6, 9, 
10 and 12, 1840, Le Capitale — a paper of Prince 
Louis', it is true — charged Léon with being a 
professional duellist, a bravo, a government spy, 
whose debts had been paid in order, once he was 
out of jail, to set him on the Prince in London. 
For these articles, September 3 following, Belle- 



1 88 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

mois, responsible editor of the Capitule, was con- 
demned to pay a fine of looo francs and 5000 
for damages (Léon had claimed 300,000) by the 
6th Chamber of Correctional Police, in spite of the 
bitter and savagely sarcastic defence of his counsel. 
Maître Moulin. Finally — and this is the last 
contribution to our knowledge of the matter — 
Prince Louis used to go about London openly 
declaring that Léon was nothing but a police spy. 

There we have the spark that fired the powder- 
magazine, for the affair came very near ending in 
a duel with pistols. On four several occasions had 
Léon presented himself at Prince Louis' door at 
7 Carlton Gardens, where he was then living. 
" I wanted to instruct you in the great truths my 
mind was busy over, thinking they ought to find 
their way to your soul," Léon explained to him 
subsequently. These "great truths," it may easily 
be guessed, were nothing else than Coëssin's 
wonderful theories. But the Queen of Holland's 
son felt no particular wish to have their esoteric 
meaning expounded to him, and on each of Leon's 
visits had him informed by his hall-porter that he 
could not see him. Indeed, very different thoughts 
filled the Prince's mind just then ; he was organ- 
izing the "invasion of Boulogne." His attention, 
however, was forcibly drawn off from these 
schemes by the following epistle which his cousin 
sent him the day after his fourth call : — 



AN INSOLENT LETTER 189 

" To His Highness the Prince Louis Bonaparte. 

"My little Cousin, — It must be owned that 
if I have shown much patience in seeking to see 
you, you have, on the other hand, shown a very 
mean discourtesy in not receiving me. You have 
allowed yourself to interpret in an evil se^tse, to my 
disadvantage and without hearing me, my uncle 
Joseph's refusal to see me. I have several times 
over left my card on you, and you have assumed 
that you could avoid sending me yours. Do you 
not think, cousin, that your behaviour towards me 
is offensive.'* I have been able to regard the ill- 
natured acts and the communications of my uncles 
Joseph and Jérôme as malicious, false, and spiteful ; 
at their age people think anything is permitted 
them ; but at yours, my little cousin, do you 
suppose it can be the same ? As you call yourself 
a Frenchman, you cannot but feel that my honour 
is offended by so much disloyalty, and that it 
behoves me to have fitting reparation. I will wait 
as long as you please, or as long as must be ; but 
I swear by the ashes of the Emperor Napoleon, 
my father, that your ill manners to me shall one 
day receive their chastisement. If I were deceiv- 
ing myself, if you had not a drop of French blood 
in your veins, from a sentiment of human dignity, 
you are bound to give me an answer to this letter ; 
or you can turn it to any evil use you prefer ; I am 
resigned to every issue. 

"With this, my little cousin, I have the honour 
to salute you. Comte Léon. 

" London, this 29 February 1S40." 



I90 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

And, in a postscript he slipped in his poisoned 
Parthian shaft : — 

" I keep a copy of this letter and propose to 
print it with a number of others at the proper 
time." 

The Prince thought it over for twenty-four 
hours and then sent Colonel Parquin to carry his 
answer to Fenton's Hotel, This man, Charles 
Parquin, a splendid soldier of the Empire, had 
some years before this thrown in his lot with Louis 
Napoleon and his fortunes. The husband of Mile 
Cochelet, reader to Queen Hortense, he had been 
one of the conspirators of Strassburg, yesterday, 
and was to be one of the invaders of Boulogne, 
to-morrow. He was the partisan, the friend, the 
most trusty ally and mainstay of the Prince. 
Speaking in soldierly fashion, Parquin informed 
Léon that his cousin refused to answer his in- 
sulting letter, and, furthermore, that he did not 
mean to have any dealings with him. The son 
of Éléonore La Plaigne seized a sheet of letter 
paper and replied there and then : — 

•' Monsieur mon Cousin, — A tall, stout gentle- 
man of the name of Parquin has just left my hotel 
after telling me from you that the letter I wrote 
you the day before yesterday accounted for your 
refusal to see me. You will understand that I 
could vouchsafe no answer to such language, which 
was the cause of much hilarity among the persons 



CHALLENGES LOUIS NAPOLEON 191 

who were with me and standing near me. You 
treat my letter with singular discourtesy, but this 
I had foreseen ; I am bound therefore to say again 
that the natural inference from this ridiculous visit 
is that you have not a drop of French blood in 
your veins. If another messenger of the sort 
comes again, I shall beg M. Guizot, our French 
Ambassador, to accompany me to see a Magistrate. 
— I salute you, Comte Léon. 

"London, the 2nd March 1840." 

In the hotel restaurant, Léon had scraped 
acquaintance with a Lieutenant-Colonel Ratcliffe 
of the English Army, serving in the 6th Dragoon 
Guards, This officer enjoyed something of a 
reputation in "female circles," where he shone as 
an amateur singer. He was said to be on the very 
best of good terms with the Duchesse de Canizzaro 
and the Dowager Lady Farquhar. He consented 
to do his new-found friend the service of carrying 
this second letter to Prince Louis, and on being 
admitted, thought fit to add verbally : '* My friend 
the Comte Léon says that, if you persist in your 
statements that he is an agent sent by the police 
to spy on you, he challenges you to a duel with 
pistols. This unworthy notion does not come 
from your heart, it is only a figment of your brain ; 
it is a blot he sees on your brow, and one only 
a pistol ball can remove." Ratcliffe's visit decided 
the Prince. Parquin has told us that he was for 



192 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

leaving Leon's insulting letters unanswered, but 
that the fact of one of them having been delivered 
by an English officer seemed to him to put another 
aspect on the quarrel, and he therefore consented 
to fight. '* Divine Providence did not permit the 
duel to take place ! " Léon declared subsequently, 
with unctuous self-gratulation. He forgot to 
explain the circumstances that prevented it, — cir- 
cumstances to which he would seem to have given 
a convenient impulse by his own action. 

The ground had been chosen on Wimbledon 
Common in a hollow near the windmill. At seven 
in the morning the Prince appeared on the spot, 
accompanied by Lieutenant-Colonel Parquin and 
one of his best friends, a famous dandy of those 
days, Count d'Orsay. Léon was there with 
Lieutenant-Colonel Ratcliffe and a M. Kien, who 
was simply a friend of Coessin's and a man of 
business in his employ. Both pistols and swords 
had been brought. The Prince declared for swords, 
for, the Argîis remarks with quite unfeigned sur- 
prise, " in France the customs of the duel give the 
one who is challenged the choice of weapons." 
But Léon, refusing to acknowledge his cousin as 
the offended party, claimed to fight with pistols. 
Pistols ? Yes, pistols ! he would have pistols and 
nothing else. They had not served him ill in his 
meeting with Captain Hesse A discussion began ; 
proposals and counter-proposals were exchanged. 



WIMBLEDON COMMON 193 

A singular sort of meeting- ! and a queer type of 
seconds, to let themselves fall into any such 
wrangle ! They even went so far as to propose 
to Léon to draw lots for weapons ! 

But all of a sudden a posse of police invaded 
the battlefield. A constable's staff was brandished, 
and the weapons, lying on the grass wrapped in 
paper, were impounded. What was the meaning 
of this ? Count d'Orsay stepped forward and de- 
manded an explanation. The constable gave his 
name; he was Chief- Inspector Nicholas Pierce, 
from the Bow Street Police Station, and he had 
with him Inspector Partridge and Sergeant Otway. 
They showed their warrant, and Count d'Orsay 
insisted on knowing from whom they had got 
wind of the time and place of the meeting. It 
was only at the station that he learned that Pierce 
had only that morning received information of the 
duel from Police Officer Baker, and that he had 
followed the Prince and his seconds in a carriage 
from Carlton Gardens all the way to Wimbledon 
Common. Meantime Lieutenant-Colonel Ratcliffe 
seized the opportunity of these delays to slip away 
with his pistols, but the policemen stopped him. 
Everybody took carriage, and back to London, 
where they were brought up before Police-Magis- 
trate Jardine at Bow Street. The fact of the duel 
was not disputed ; Pierce, being sworn, described 
the circumstances, and eventually the Magistrate 
13 



194 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

charged the principals to Hve henceforward at 
peace with all His Britannic Majesty's subjects in 
general and with each other in particular. As 
guarantee of the engagement they entered into 
to this effect, he ordered them to give their recog- 
nizances, — the Prince and Léon in the sum of 
£'JS^ each ; Count d'Orsay, Lieutenant-Colonels 
Parquin and Ratcliffe, ;^I50 each; as for the 
obliging Kien, he got off with ^loo. There was 
some delay and demur about these recognizances 
and the persons to act as sureties. It was on 
the money question that the shoe pinched Count 
d'Orsay and Count Léon so cruelly. ^750 ! The 
Magistrate was a hard man ! Eventually Count 
d'Orsay offered a compromise that was accepted ; 
the Magistrate ruled that a single surety would 
suffice to include the two, the Prince and Colonel 
Parquin, and agreed to the selection of Mr. Joshua 
Bates, a partner in the celebrated banking house 
of Baring Brothers, and a personal friend of Prince 
Napoleon's, whose drafts he had agreed to honour 
to a very substantial amount.^ For Count d'Orsay 

1 " Mr. Bates was one of the Prince's most devoted friends, 
and he not only offered him hospitaHty at East Sheen, but 
ahvays kept a credit of ;^2ooo open to him at his bank." — 
Blanchard Jerrold, Life of Napoleon the Third (London, 1875, 
8vo). For further information about Bates, see a very rare 
brochure : A Tribute of Boston Merchants to the Memory of 
Joshua Bates (Boston, printed for private circulation, October 
1864, 8vo). 



ON BAIL 195 

and Ratcliffe, Baring himself, the great banker, 
a Member of ParHament, and son-in-law of the 
Due de Bassano, was willing to stand security. 
Lastly, the Comte Léon found his surety in the 
person of Mr. Fenton, landlord of the hotel where 
he was staying. Thus the quarrel was ended, the 
confiscated weapons given back, and the culprits 
set at liberty. 

The same evening, by way of showing how 
entirely they were at one with their nephew in the 
affair, which had immediately set everybody talk- 
ing, Joseph and Jerome attended the Italian Opera 
and shared the same box with Louis Napoleon. 

Moreover, the Press showed itself little disposed 
to spare Léon. The Atlas called him in so many 
words, "that blackguard, that professional butcher." 
Nor did Lieutenant-Colonel Ratcliffe escape his 
share of the censure attaching to the business. 
" Lieutenant-Colonel Ratcliffe, who was in earri- 
son at Enniskillen in Ireland, would seem to have 
wished to play the bully," was the comment of one 
paper. But a greater calamity than this public 
reprobation awaited him soon after ; he went mad.^ 
The newspapers attributed his mental alienation 
to the reproaches he had to endure from "the 

1 "We read in a private letter from London that Colonel 
Ratcliffe, who acted as the Comte Leon's second, has gone mad 
and has had to be shut up." — Gazette de France, edit, des 
départements et de l'extérieur, 12 mars 1840. 



196 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

whole of London society." Many added, like the 
Capitale : "It is stated that certain particulars 
the Colonel would seem to have learned regarding 
M. Léon and the suspicion of having been involun- 
tarily mixed up in base political intrigues have so 
painfully affected this high-minded officer that he 
has lost his reason in consequence." He had been 
very quick about getting himself into a strait- 
jacket. Léon, very naturally, denied all responsi- 
bility for this sudden catastrophe. Shortly after- 
wards he explained: "The true cause of his 
madness, as all his family are aware, is that 
Colonel Ratcliffe, having good reasons for hoping 
to be made Chief Equerry to Prince Albert, gave 
a great dinner at Fenton's hotel to his relations 
and a number of his friends. After this dinner, at 
which a great deal of port and sherry were con- 
sumed, the Colonel visited the theatre, where he 
had a quarrel in the orchestra with the musicians. 
He was removed to his hotel in such a state of 
exasperation that it drove him mad." Any way, 
this abortive duel was Leon's last. 

Daily more and more deeply imbued with the 
saving grace of Coessin's spirit abiding in him, he 
felt himself bound, he, the swashbuckler of 1832, 
the fire-eater of 1840, to condemn publicly ap- 
peal to the arbitrament of arms. Laying down 
the laws to govern the future society of the 
" Children of God," he decreed : " If two citizens 



IGNORED 197 

have a difference of opinion, instead of fighting, 
they will appeal successively to the divers juris- 
dictions established to adjudicate on the question 
in dispute, and when the magistrates are divided 
as to the application of the law, proceedings laid 
down beforehand will indicate the means of putting 
an end to the conflict, without its being necessary 
to have recourse to the hazard of a violent en- 
counter." A fine sermon, — but rather like shutting 
the stable door after the steed's stolen ! 

Before very long the scandal of the affair 
oblio^ed him to leave Fenton's hotel and to go 
and board with a middle -class family. He 
scarcely saw a soul, no longer possessing so 
much as a coat fit for going out into the world. 
Who indeed would have received him now ? He 
was banned by society, curious enough it may be 
as to his supposed birth and eager to know the 
facts, but disgusted by the scandals and disreput- 
able escapades in which he took an ostentatious 
delight. The Family was now determined to 
ignore him. Joseph and Jerome closed their 
doors against him for ever, and Meneval himself, 
Meneval all clemency and good-nature, came to 
long for his exile to some other land, — no matter 
where, if only it were remote enough. On March 
16 we find him writing to Joseph : ** I have heard 
of the follies the unhappy fellow has been commit- 
ting. I did not need this fresh instance of his 



198 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

wrong-headedness, there is no other word, to un- 
derstand the good reasons that compel you to 
have nothing further to do with him. What I 
was aiming at when I wrote to you about him 
was that he might be enabled to quit France 
and Europe, where I fear he might make some 
disastrous scandal." Quit Europe? Not a bit 
of it. London, well and good, — he had met 
with nothing but disappointment and chagrin 
there ; but banish himself far away from Paris, 
that Paradise of sharpers, not he! He hurried 
back there at the very first opportunity, borrow- 
ing from a Frenchman established in business in 
London, a M. Vouillon, thirty louis for travelling 
expenses. The fever for new ventures was upon 
him. He crossed the Channel, leaving behind 
with Messrs. Joy, of Bloomsbury Square, No. 
44, entrance in Hart Street round the corner, 
the lamps " with revolving stand " with which 
that sublime lunatic of a Coëssin had entrusted 
him. They kept his Aladdin's lamps for him. 
They had nothing of the sort in England ! 




Baron Dii AFexeval. 
After a Lithograph by Auguste Bky. 



CHAPTER III 

FROM ROGUERY TO MYSTICISM, TAKING 
POLITICS BY THE WAY 

Léon back from his English trip — A squabble with Virginie 
Déjazet — " A scurvy fellow ! " — Éléonore in a new rôle — 
M. de Luxbourg Bavarian Minister in Paris — Musical 
evenings — Lawsuit in connexion with an Imperial lover's 
douceur — Léon versus Éléonore — They take a leaf out of 
Revel's book — Mme de Luxbourg nonsuited and her 
husband recalled — Léon and General Gourgaud — Three 
unpublished begging letters — Penniless and at bay ; down 
in the depths — Léon as a politician — The "Société 
Pacifique" — The enterprise before the public — Léon and 
the throne of Italy — The electors will have none of him 
— Another quarrel, about an iron bedstead — The Police 
Court again — Flaunts his illegitimacy. 

So now, penniless and very much run to seed, we 
have Léon disembarking on the Continent after 
his English escapade. He had to live, and live 
on a certain footing, for he had his needs and 
appetites. Perhaps he went back to the "self- 
styled Mme Lesieur" of the Rue des Petits- 
Carreaux and the ineffable Coëssin, But evi- 
dently what they did to help was not enough, for 
it was not long before he was mixed up in sundry 
combinations of which we may make bold to say. 



200 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

without calumny, that more honest ones might be 
found. He is busy with underhand agencies, 
obscure commissions, shady enterprises of all 
sorts, in which, of course, he plays anything but 
a brilliant part. What was his share in the 
transaction about the purchase by Mile Dejazet 
of a country house at Seine-Port from Bossio, the 
sculptor of the Napoleon on the Column of the 
Grand Army at Boulogne ? We can only form 
a judgment from two derelict fragments among 
the papers left behind by the actress and her 
lover Arthur Bertrand, the son of the Bertrand 
of St. Helena. Arthur Bertrand is writing to 
the landlord of the suburban toper : — 

" Monsieur, — I wrote yesterday to M. le Comte 
Léon ; the same evening I went to his house to 
leave your note in person and beg him to be so 
kind as to give you an answer before noon to- 
day. I do not know if you have seen him or if 
his business agent has been with you ; but I must 
confess that the promise made by him to Mile 
Dejazet (at any rate / think so) is not being 
fulfilled. I saw his business agent yesterday, 
and he entertained me with fine phrases for an hour 
together, to be delivered of a refusal in the end. I 
hope that M. Quin (?) or you. Sir, may be able 
to arrange the matter. It is a mistake, I believe, 
the purchase of this property, and one that will 
perhaps involve Mile Dejazet in many annoy- 
ances. I shall have the pleasure of coming to 



BACK IN PARIS 201 

see you to-day, Sir, or of leaving a word for you. 
Accept the expression, etc. — Yours devotedly, 

"Arthur Bertrand. 

" Friday, 2 9 July 1 84 1 ." 

At identically the same time, or very nearly, 
writing from Boulogne-sur-Mer, where she was 
acting, Déjazet was holding forth to Bertrand : — 

"What you tell me about the Comte Léon, 
dear, surprises and angers me, for after all it was 
not I who asked him to do me this service, but he 
who, so to speak, threw it at my head, — and now 
we have him wanting a guarantee ! Offer him an 
assignment at three months on the box-takings of 
the house ; but if you can find anyone else, do 
not hesitate to rid me of this gentleman, who 
has already caused me so many annoyances that I 
cannot owe him the smallest grratitude. All the 
same, what I have been told of him quite explains 
his lack of good faith ; everywhere I hear the 
same : ' Ah ! yes, the Comte Léon, a scurvy fellow 
that ! ' You beg me to keep my good temper ; 
what do you expect me to do by way of losing it ? 
If I wrote to him, I should be too outspoken to 
hide my displeasure from him, that is why I left 
without doing so ; if he gets me out of the difficulty, 
I shall have to thank him, and these thanks will 
cost me more than you can well believe. God 
grant you may succeed in another quarter, and I 
shall be only too delighted to write and tell him 
what I think." 



202 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

The incident, no doubt, is of very slight import- 
ance, and to record it adds little or nothing to the 
Comte Leon's history, but it adds another line to 
the picture of his mentality, it is another small 
contribution to our knowledge of his character. 
" I wish I were illegitimate ! " the great Emperor 
one day exclaimed to Hortense, exasperated by 
the quarrels of his relatives. Léon was what his 
father would fain have been, but it did not get him 
out of his difficulties, far from it ! Thrown on his 
own resources, he was now the broken flotsam and 
jetsam of a great shipwreck, a man gone under, 
ready for the basest uses, hunting for a livelihood, 
— reputable or not, what matter ? He was little 
better than a common mendicant. 

Then he remembered his mother, the mother 
for whom he had once bought diamonds, 10,000 
francs' worth at a time. M. de Luxbourg was in 
Paris, and as Envoy Extraordinary and Minister 
Plenipotentiary of the King of Bavaria kept house 
like a great nobleman. The fact is, the little 
diplomat of earlier days had made giant strides 
since. On February i, 1816, he had been appointed 
Bavarian Minister at Dresden ; on November 9, 
1820, Privy Councillor; on February i, 1826, 
Minister at Berlin, in commendam with his post at 
Dresden, and, July 12, 1829, Councillor of State on 
special service. Ten years later he was sent to 
Paris, — November 8, 1839. He had already lived 



MUSICAL EVENINGS 203 

there for a while, in 1823, and Revel had at that 
period made no bones about dubbing him a horse- 
cheat. "This falsely styled husband of Mme 
Revel," he wrote at the time, " is earning himself 
the repute of a Prince in town ; they say the fine 
fellow has a dozen horses in his stables ! ... He 
may well have a dozen, or even a score, or more, 
as he is a horse-dealer." I give this for what it is 
worth coming from the pen of this highwayman, 
but other details supplied by contemporary German 
writers seem to me more trustworthy. From them 
we learn that M. de Luxbourg's house was much 
frequented because of the musical treats to be 
enjoyed there. Jenny Lind, "the Swedish nightin- 
gale," her singing-master Manuel Garcia, and 
young Ferdinand von Strantz, afterwards Director 
of the Royal Opera at Berlin, were the delight of 
music lovers. These entertainments were fre- 
quented by the best society. Êléonore, very 
dignified, with whitening locks, — was she not. 
getting on now for the wrong side of fifty ? — 
presided at these musical evenings to which the 
dandies flocked. In the beginning Léon too was 
to be seen there. Between mother and son the 
fondest harmony reigned, and the former was 
escorted by the latter to the Bois, to fêtes, to 
public functions such as the inauguration of the 
Arc-de-Triomphe, for which he petitioned, July 22, 
1836, for places from the Intendant General of the 



204 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

Civil List. " The inauguration of the Arc-de- 
Triomphe recalls in my case memories so dear I 
cannot but hasten to crave admission at the same 
time for my mother and her friends to the reserved 
tribunes," wrote Leon.^ 

But with such a man no good understanding 
could possibly last long, and this case formed no 
exception. Of course it was a question of money 
that brought about the rupture. It will be remem- 
bered that, at the time of her marriage with Augier, 
Eleonore had had settled on her by the Emperor 
an annual income of 22,000 francs from stock in- 
scribed in the Great Book of the National Debt. 
The agent employed in the transaction had been 
Jean-Claude Henry, Jurisconsult, residing in Paris 
in the Rue Feydeau, the same who had previously 
figured in Eléonore's act of divorce. The business 
led in 1827 to unexpected consequences. On 
Henry's decease, his heirs filed a claim before the 
Tribunal of Château-Thierry to the property in- 
volved in the supposed settlement of 1808. The 
Tribunal on August 30, 1828, nonsuited the makers 
of this audacious demand. But during the progress 

^ Ordered to be constructed by Imperial Decree of February 
18, 1806, the Arc-de-Triomphe was begun in May 1806 ; but in 
1 8 14 on the fall of Napoleon the works were interrupted, and 
only taken up again in 1823, in virtue of a Royal rescript of 
October 9 in that year. Finished in 1836, the Arc-de-Triomphe 
was inaugurated on July 29. — Cf. J. Thierry et G. Coulon, Notice 
historique de l'Arc de Triomphe de P Étoile (Paris, 1844, Svo). 



LÉON VERSUS ÉLÉONORE 205 

of the case Léon had advanced, to meet the ex- 
penses of his mother's defence, sums which before 
long reached a total of 25,000 francs. To re- 
imburse him for this outlay, Ëléonore, acting with 
her husband's consent, executed a deed, dated 
June 17, 1 83 1, before M. Outrebon, Notary at Paris, 
transferring to Léon the stock, barring life interest, re- 
presenting the 22,000 francs to the amount of 16,000 
francs. He at once made over 3000 francs a year 
to a M. Daublaine. But the Treasury refused to 
sanction those two transfers, while Ëléonore on her 
side showed some dilatoriness in carrying through 
the formalities, whereupon her son immediately 
cited her before the Correctional Police for trickery. 
The Luxbourgs, husband and wife, retaliated with 
a charge of instituting calumnious and vexatious 
proceedings, and cancelled the deed of gift of the 
stock executed on June 17, 1831. However, the 
two cases, one as scandalous as the other, never 
came up for trial, the interested parties crying off. 

It was not long before they were again face to 
face. Léon, trying another jurisdiction, brought a 
civil suit demanding a share of the 22,000 francs. 
The case was only finally adjudicated in 1846; in 
February 16 of that year the Second Chamber of 
the Royal Court of Paris nonsuited Léon on this 
claim. As surety, he had appealed to — whom do 
you suppose ? — Augier, Augier de la Sauzaie 
himself, who, if we are to credit his story, was 



2o6 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

a warder guarding the convicts in the mines of 
Tobolsk! It was starting all over again the 
proceedings which had ended in failure for Revel, 
and which, if they had been sanctioned now, would 
have sent Êléonore back before the Court of Assize 
for bigamy. But, while waiting to be beaten on 
this count, Léon had instituted fresh proceedings 
against his mother on a claim for an alimentary 
allowance. Twice over the case was remanded. 
In self-defence Eléonore resorted to a singular plea ; 
she denied that she was his mother at all, and 
borrowing in her turn one of Revel's ruses, she 
based her assertion on the discrepancy in the 
spelling of her name in Leon's baptismal certificate. 
In it she was described as Êléonore Denuel, which 
surely had nothing in common with her real name, 
to wit, Louise-Catherine-Êléonore Denuelle de La 
Plaigne. Ingenious as the point was, it did not 
save her from being adjudged, October 22, 1845, 
by the Civil Tribunal of the Seine to pay her son 
an alimentary allowance of 6000 francs.^ As she 
made default in payment, proceedings were once 
more taken, when it was argued that it was not 

^ Possibly Léon brought the action in virtue of the principle 
laid down by Napoleon at a sitting of the Council of State on 
5 Vendémiaire, Year x, to wit : " A rich father in easy circum- 
stances always owes the paternal mess of pottage to his 
children." — Julien Bottet, Le Premier Consul au Conseil (f État 
lors de la discicssion du projet de Code civil (Amiens, 1898, 
8vo), p. 39. 



i 



COMTE DE LUXBOURG RECALLED 207 

within the competence of the First Tribunal to 
declare her to be the mother of the child, as indeed 
was allowed, April 17, 1846, by the Royal Court, 
which quashed the previous decision. Léon im- 
mediately betook himself to the Fifth Chamber of 
the Civil Tribunal and demanded leave to bring 
proof of Êléonore's maternity. M. Mahon, the 
Procureur du Roi, gave judgment on June 25 in his 
favour, and on December 2 following, the Royal 
Court confirmed the decision and re - affirmed 
Êléonore's liability, now reduced, however, to an 
allowance of 4000 francs. But all these legal 
proceedings were not unrelieved by exciting inci- 
dents. Léon had, in particular, a quarrel with a 
lawyer's clerk, one Delorme, who waylaid him 
outside the court and gave him a drubbing. More 
going to law, of course! On March 13, 1847, 
Delorme was sentenced to fifteen days' imprison- 
ment and to pay a fine of 100 francs. He appealed, 
only to get his sentence increased by 1000 francs 
for damages. This time, I presume, the limb of 
the law was satisfied. 

However, these repeated scandals had unpleas- 
ant results for M. de Luxbourg. The Bavarian 
Government deemed it impossible to have as their 
representative at Paris an individual mixed up in 
such very notorious affairs. On October i, 1847, 
the Minister was relieved of his office, and for the 
time being retired. " M. le Comte de Luxbourg, 



2o8 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

Envoy Extraordinary and Minister Plenipotentiary 
of His Majesty the King of Bavaria, has handed in 
to the King at a special audience the letters of recall 
which put an end to the office he filled as his 
Majesty's representative," we read in a gazette of 
October 5, 1846. Prince Ludwig von Oettingen- 
Wallerstein replaced him at Paris, while the other 
returned to Bavaria with a rather unenviable reputa- 
tion. 

But if Léon got a roasting on leaving the Law 
Courts, he had his share likewise in roasting others, 
and being himself condemned for assault and battery. 
An incident of the kind leads us to say a word or 
two about his relations with General Gourgaud. Re- 
turning from St. Helena under circumstances that 
still remain dubious, and kept at arm's length by 
the Restoration, Gourgaud had only regained Court 
favour under the July Monarchy. He wore the 
aureole of the missionary band of St. Helena ; he 
enjoyed the melancholy glory of having been one of 
the last friends of the captive Emperor. He made 
public profession of the "faith," even going so far 
as to have consented, " out of respect for the 
memory of the Emperor," to be Leon's second in 
the fatal duel with Captain Hesse. Léon showed 
his gratitude, in 1834, by acting as his electoral 
agent in that same Arrondissement of Saint-Denis 
which was still agog with excitement over his famous 
quarrel with the Colonel of the National Guard. 



A SPECIAL INVITATION 209 

" Do me the kindness, my dear friend Léon, to give 
me some tidings of our election,'' we find him writing 
at that time, adding further : ** Your powerful inter- 
vention gives me good chances. . . . Remember 
that in working for me, you are also working for 
yourself ; for I should be only too happy to quit the 
Chamber to make room for you. ..." Léon in 
the Chamber } . . . H'm ! . . . Later on he turned 
the notion to some profit, but for the present his 
dispute with the National Guard took up all his 
attention. 

But a time of more serious difficulties and more 
painful quarrels came, the period of his lawsuits 
with Êléonore, when money grew very tight. When 
Napoleon's ashes were brought back to France, and 
Léon had a special invitation to the ceremony at 
the Invalides,^ he was reduced to bee2"inof. Three 

1 Below is a copy of the document, quoted by M^ Crémieux, 
Leon's advocate, in his pleadings before the Royal Court of Paris, 
sitting of December 28, 1846, against Mme de Luxbourg: — 

" Cabinet du Roi, 
From the Tuileries, the 13 December 1840. 
" M. LE Comte, — The letter you have written to the King has 
just been put in his hands. His Majesty could do nothing but 
send it on to the Minister of the Interior, who is in direction of 
all details of the procession and ceremony ; but he has done so 
at once, and by a special note in his own hand. Be so good as 
to accept, Sir, etc., 

"Camille Fain, 
Secretary of the King's Cabinet.'^ 

The letter is to be read in the Gazette des Tribunaux of 28 
and 29 December 1846. — With regard to the ceremony at the 
14 



^lo AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

times between 1840 and 1845, Gourgaud lent him 
650 francs, and it was to ask another loan that the 
Emperor's son wrote to him : — 

" My dear General, — I have been several 
times to your house, but it is only to-day I learn 
that you are ill ; I believe your condition is in no 
way very alarming, still be so good as to send me a 
word of reassurance. You have been very kind to 
me ; you have, since the return of the Emperor's 
remains to France, advanced me on three occasions 
six hundred and fifty francs. I shall always be 
grateful to you, for in this age of selfishness and 
demoralization you have shown yourself noble and 
good to me ; I thank you from the bottom of my 
heart. No one could behave worse than my mother 
is doing to me ; by a succession of quibbles and 
subterfuges she drags out all proceedings ; she 
knows how I am situated, and wants to starve me 
out. But, thank God, if you do not forsake me, I 

Invalides, we add a curious note published by the paper Le Con- 
stitutionel, 25 December 1840: "So great was the crowd on 
Tuesday at the Hôtel des Invalides that over twenty-five thousand 
persons were unable to make their way into the interior of the 
Chapel, and that the soldiers of the guard, driven back into the 
Second Court, could not prevent the numerous accidents that 
occurred. A lady, forcibly separated from her husband, fell under 
the feet of the crowd ; she was rescued with difficulty, covered 
with bruises and in the most deplorable condition. Another 
woman, in an advanced stage of pregnancy, was so squeezed by 
the press that, seized suddenly with the pains of childbirth, she 
there and then in the garden gave birth to a fine boy. In 
accordance with an express wish of the Queen's, the child will 
receive the name of Napoléon-Sauveur-Bienvenu." 



BEGGING LETTERS 211 

shall triumph over all obstacles, and come out 
victorious from this struggle, which has been going 
on since 1840. 

"In order to get back certain law documents of 
mine illegally detained by a man of business by the 
name of Justou, I was forced to use violence ; for 
this I was cited before the Correctional Police. I 
could not deny the evidence, and I have been con- 
demned to paya fine of 1 10 francs. I have not the 
money, my dear General ; I count on you, I trust 
you will help me this once more. You will see from 
the paper I send you enclosed herewith that my 
personal freedom is involved. 

" Grant me to-morrow, Saturday, a moment's 
interview, that I may shake you by the hand ; for if 
I have need of money, as is unhappily the case, you 
cannot refuse to see me and hinder my testifying all 
my gratitude for your past kindnesses. 

" With all my heart and soul, my dear General, 

" Comte Léon. 

" Rue Joubert, No. 3, Friday, 2e^/uly 1845." 

Did Gourgaud prove amenable to this appeal } 
There is every reason to think so, for subsequently 
Léon began to beg again, and not without success. 
But in these days it was not only the charitable 
feelings of the companion of the captive Napoleon 
that he exploited to his advantage. In 1846 he 
was at free quarters in the house of a lady, widow 
of an old General Officer, who lodged and fed him, 
because she "had not forgotten what she and her 



212 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

husband owe to the Emperor's memory." To all 
appearance this did not last very long. Although 
able to rely on the alimentary allowance which his 
mother had been ordered, at his instance, to pay, 
he was, as early as 1848, in the deepest distress. 
This man, an Emperor's son, was living in squalid 
slums, sleeping in doss-houses at 20 sous the 
night or some such figure. From the daily hell 
in which he was sunk, ruined, degraded, despised, 
furious at the destitution that stared him in the 
face, he returns again to the attack ; Gourgaud 
was his last resource. His feelings are hurt if he 
is shown the door, and he makes no secret of his 
resentment at the want of the consideration he 
considers he has a right to expect. Gourgaud 
is at once the object and the recipient of his bitter 
complaints : — 

" General, — The answer you gave me, through 
your servant, to my letter of January 25 last, the 
one 1 sent you by M. Charbonnel, — an answer I 
was far from expecting after the hopes you raised 
in my heart when I visited you to lay my difficulties 
before you in a personal interview, has put me in 
a position of great embarrassment. M. Caillieux 
has insisted on my paying or leaving his house 
immediately ; I was forced to quit my lodgings 
a few minutes after, with the only garment I had 
to my back. He has ruthlessly detained my trunk, 
in which I had packed all my worldly goods and 



MORE BEGGING LETTERS 213 

my papers, as well as a picture of value representing 
the Emperor at Waterloo. 

" Thank God, I have rented a room in the 
Rue Joubert, at No. 9, but it has been impossible 
for me to put a bed in it as yet, so as to sleep there, 
for want of money. I am sleeping for the time 
being in a miserable furnished room at 20 sous 
a day, where I am very uncomfortable. I am 
going to beg you, my dear General, to be so kind 
as to lend me a little money to buy a bed, and 
I will pay you back as soon as ever I can. I shall 
be very grateful to you for the loan. 

" Accept, I beg you, my dear General, the 
sincere expression of my affection and my highest 
esteem, Comte Léon. 

"Paris, the 7 February 1848. 

" P.S. — I should be very glad to see you, and 
I beg you to name the hour at which I may call 
on you." 

Gourgaud had been at Waterloo, on the 
Emperor's staff. Was it the story of the picture in 
which he figures perhaps himself as Aide-de-Camp, 
amid the battle smoke and bursting shells, that 
touched his heart and inclined him to make this 
new loan he was asked for ? Could he leave the 
son of the man with whom he had lived at St. 
Helena, who had called him his "boy," to wallow 
in this black poverty ? True , . . very true . . . 
but Léon is a very terrible, a very persistent 
borrower ! This moderated the General's gener- 



214 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

osity, and in a corner of the letter we find the 
memorandum : " Sent ^o francs, Feb. 7. — GJ' A 
fatal mistake ! He is caught in the wheels, he 
will never get loose, — unless Léon escapes the 
abyss in which he is now struggling madly. A 
few weeks more, and the begging letters start 
afresh : 

" To Monsieur le Général Gotirgaud. 

" Rue Joubert, No. 30, 
Paris, August 20, 1848. 

" My dear General, — As I notified you in 
my last letter of February 28, I have had to leave 
M. Caillieux' house and take a lodging at No. 9 of 
the Rue Joubert, in a scantily furnished room. I 
have been unable to pay the April quarter, and 
they have relet my room and detained the trifle 
of furniture I had till such time as I can pay the 
two quarters, which come to 125 francs. I have 
been obliged therefore to settle myself in a small 
furnished room. Rue de Provence, No. 63, Cité 
(Léon misspells the word Citée) d'Antin, as I 
had been advised by General Fournier, now 
deceased. 

" Since the days of February, setting my hopes 
on Prince Napoleon Louis' arrival, I have refused 
to accept anything from the Republic ; I have not 
been able to get a farthing from anybody. I cannot 
so much as pay two months' rent for my furnished 
room, and in this unhappy predicament I have 
recourse again to you, my dear General, beseeching 
you to come to my assistance ; I shall be very 



"CAUGHT IN THE WHEELS" 215 

grateful. If you will see M. Charbonnel, the 
bearer of this letter, he will be able to inform you 
at length of my affairs and my position. I am ill, 
I cannot leave the house. 

"Accept, my dear General, the homage of my 
most sincere affection, Comte Léon." 

I said before, and I say it again, — Gourgaud is 
caught in the wheels. Sadly, he notes on the 
margin of the letter : " Given y:> francs the 20 
August 1848." — Given . . . yes, it is a case of giving 
now, not lending. And then 1848 ..." the days of 
February . . ." the Government of Louis Philippe 
has fallen ; the Republic is established. Fie ! fie ! 
Léon, disgusted, his gentlemanly feelings outraged, 
cannot stomach the bread of the vulgar, red-capped 
wench. He says so himself, he hopes for the 
return of Prince Louis Napoleon. What ? Louis 
Napoleon of all people ? Why, certainly. No 
doubt he tried in 1840, in his London days, to cut 
the gentleman's throat ; but that is ancient history. 
His cousin must have forgotten it all, a thing ke 
barely recollects, and makes nothing of! Mean- 
time he will go in for politics, and for a beginning 
just stand for the Presidency of the Republic. But 
there, perhaps this is rather a large order ? "I 
should be very happy to quit the Chamber to make 
room for you," Gourgaud had written to him in 
1834. An excellent idea, and now was the time 
to put it into execution. He had hoped to be 



2i6 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

President ; he would condescend to a seat in the 
Chamber, and he organized his campaign in the 
constituency of Saint-Denis, where his memory was 
still green. "A child of Paris," so he worded his 
manifestos to the electors, " my birth is well 
known to you all ; it is glorious, and I have pre- 
ferred to fight face to face against the scandalous 
and never-ending chicaneries of every sort of my 
opponents rather than stain it by rallying to a 
Government that inspired in a man of integrity 
only disgust and contempt." The "man of 
integrity " was himself, Léon ! The electors chose 
another candidate, and he retreated, beaten but not 
embittered. 

The grace of God, the beams of the Coessin sun 
illuminated him. An apostolic zeal burned once 
more in his bosom, and in testimony thereof he 
founded — March 26, 1849, is the date — the Société 
Pacifique, depositing the fundamental laws of its 
constitution at the office of Maître Aumont- 
Thiéville. It was a kind of daughter association 
affiliated with the work of the " Children of God." 
Its object was "to organize a series of productive 
works that may provide the French People with the 
means of living by the labour of their hands." The 
installation of economical kitchens formed part of 
his programme. To attract adherents, only means 
that were frank and above board were to be 
employed. " Persuasion is the sole mode of action 



A PHILANTHROPIC SOCIETY 217 

of the Society, to the exclusion of all agitation or 
external self-advertisement." Its resources were to 
be drawn from the benevolent generosity of the 
public. The shares were fixed at the modest price 
of five francs, payable — an unprecedented innova- 
tion ! — in kind or in work. Besides this, — "the 
President of the Society counts upon the co-opera- 
tion of all well-meaning persons to help him to 
continue its publications by forwarding him a 
donation of five francs by Post Office order." The 
alluring prospectus went on to add : "The names, 
however, of adherents will be received without any 
contribution to the Society's funds." A wise 
proviso ! The whole plan of the thing breathed 
the spirit of a strange socialistic mysticism, 
summed up by Léon in these terms : " If I have 
any ambition, it is to prove by results that the 
Catholic Religion, Roman and Apostolic, alone 
gives the means of realizing the sublime motto 
inscribed on the flag of the Republic, — Liberty, 
Equality, Fraternity." It was to set the French 
People on the direct road to happiness. Seconded 
by M. Deniau, Vice-President of the Committee of 
Purposes ; M. André Marius, Representative of 
the people, Supervisor of Expenses of the same 
Committee ; Mme de Saurimont, Treasurer ; M. 
Darnault, Auditor of Accounts, and M. Decourde- 
manche. Jurisconsult, President of the College of 
Preceptors, Léon had, as President - Founder, 



2i8 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

undertaken this generous task. We shall see later 
on that he did not advance it very far. 

However, for some months he taxed his 
ingenuity to advertise the scheme. On June 28, 
1849, he petitioned the National Assembly for a 
subvention of a million francs in aid of the Society. 
He pledged himself to consecrate this sum to the 
extinction of pauperism and the publication of a 
print open to polemical discussions destined to 
improve the constitution of the Republic. The 
Assembly demanded time for reflexion. Léon there- 
upon addressed himself, on August 6 following, to 
the Romans, "my brethren," exhorting them to 
put off the spirit of revolt France had inspired 
them with, to make themselves worthy " to receive 
the true spirit of peace." He urged them to "go 
abroad into your temples and pray God to give 
you this new spirit." He offered an example him- 
self of his teaching by clandestinely canvassing the 
throne of Italy. The Pope received from him in 
this connexion some very extraordinary letters. 
These papers the Archives of the Vatican preserve 
with a jealous discretion. None the less the apostle 
did not fail to persevere with his propaganda in 
France, and I am bound to say he never forgot to 
put in a word in his sermons for his saints. Thus, 
in 1849, he announced, by broadsheet, to the Legis- 
lative Assembly that it was urgent to grant a 
suspension of proceedings for one year in the case 



CANDIDATE FOR THE CHAMBER 219 

of seizures of real estate. He would seem to have 
been aiming a blow here at his obdurate landlord 
in the Rue Joubert ! But the Government refused 
to play its part in the farce. 

Léon concluded that, if only he had a seat, he 
would stand a better chance of brin^inor his P"reat and 
multifarious designs to a good issue. In July 1849 
he had again solicited the votes of the electors of 
Saint-Denis. He aspired to be the Job of Parlia- 
ment apparently, for he placarded proudly and 
ostentatiously the fact of his dilapidated finances. 
" I have lived in poverty for over fifteen years," he 
declared ; " I know the sorrows of the poor man, I 
shall be faithful to his cause." But it was a case of 
" Sister Anne, Sister Anne, do you see them 
coming?" and they never came, and Job- Léon was 
left on the dunghill of his debts and the bed of the 
Sheriff Officer's exploits. For with these officers of 
the Government he had not ceased to have dealings. 
This same year, 1849, he had again come into 
touch with them, having been indeed very seldom 
out of touch since 1847, — and this in connexion 
with an affair where yet again he displays an astute- 
ness well matched with an elastic conscience. I 
will recapitulate the facts. 

In 1849, Léon had made acquaintance on the 
Bourse of a M. Jean Bernard, a man of forty-seven, 
residing permanently at Lyons, but for the time 
staying in Paris, in the Avenue des Champs-Elysées. 



220 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

Bernard was highly flattered to find himself on 
friendly terms with so illustrious a person. He 
was still more gratified when Léon, in confidence, 
told him that he was going to be appointed 
Ambassador in Russia ; that the French Govern- 
ment, being afraid of him, was anxious to remove 
him to a distance ; and that just at that very moment 
he was in search of a Secretary of Embassy, — a 
post for which he, Bernard, appeared eminently 
fitted. Bernard's imagination took fire. Secretary 
of Embassy, think of it ! He never left Leon's 
heels, rating him all the higher inasmuch as he 
entertained an extravagant admiration for the late 
Emperor. Every evening the pair went to drink 
their liquor at a certain tavern in the Passage 
Jouffroy, and whenever the hot-headed Bernard 
raised his voice too high, Léon would check him, 
saying "Hush, hush, Duroc ! " A Bernard-Duroc 
henchman of a Léon-Napoléon, — what a climax to 
the Imperial epic ! Every time, of course, bocks, 
glasses and petits verres were paid for by the en- 
thusiastic Bernard. 

He even carried his generosity further. One 
fine day, at one Henry's, he purchased for 
Léon an iron bedstead, the settlement for which 
brought about between them the most regrettable 
discussions. It was the Goddess of Discord shaking 
her flaming brand over their heads ! Bernard- 
Duroc meeting Léon- Napoléon on the boulevard, 



BERNARD-DUROC 221 

apostrcohized him furiously : " Give me back my 
bedstead, I say ! Will you give it back ? " Léon 
told him to go away, but the other only reiterated 
his demand, whereupon Léon cut him short, saying 
soothingly : " If you don't get out of it, I shall have 
to slap your face ! " Not a happy thought ! Instantly 
Duroc began to yell horribly and shout at the top 
of his voice: "Thieves! Murder! There stands 
the thief, there's the murderer ! " A crowd collected, 
much interested in the noisy brawl. Howling and 
dishevelled, Bernard threw himself amongst the 
bystanders, vociferating : " Help, help. Sovereign 
People ! I put myself under the protection of the 
Nation ! It's Count Léon ! He's robbing me ! 
He's murdering me ! " The thing was verging on 
melodrama. With dignity Léon broke off the 
unseemly wrangle by springing into a hackney- 
coach, which sped away to the nearest Commissary 
of Police. The case was serious. Had not this 
quarrelsome fellow repeated his insulting behaviour 
by going to Leon's lodging. No. 9 Boulevard des 
Italiens, and leaving open letters at the door 
containing the blackest infamies, telling the porter : 
"Look here, here's something for your swindler 
tenant " ? Only the Correctional Police was com- 
petent to avenge Léon-Napoléon for Duroc- 
Bernard's foul calumnies. Things moved apace. 
On February 21, Bernard was sentenced by the 
Eighth Chamber to ten days' imprisonment for 



222 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

insult and defamation of character against Léon. 
But, turning the tables, still in connexion with the 
iron bedstead, cause of all the trouble, he sued Léon 
as author of the swindle. All he gained was another 
fifteen days' imprisonment for bringing a slanderous 
charge. He added on a fifty francs' fine too ; and 
finally, having appealed against the judgment as 
a whole, was condemned by the Civil Court to pay 
looo francs' damages to Léon into the bargain. It 
was a truly imperial piece of effrontery ending in a 
truly imperial triumph ! We may be sure poor 
Bernard thought twice in the future before he 
cultivated the society of such-like scions of noble 
lineage ! 

Escapades of the sort, which supplied endless 
comic copy to the papers, invested Leon's name 
with a not altogether enviable notoriety. It was in 
the dock of the Police Courts and at the bar of the 
Civil Tribunals that his sinister reputation was 
made. Thirsty for fame, he sought it in politics 
and the dissemination of Coessin's theories ; proudly 
he draped himself in the title of " son of Napoleon," 
which he dragged through the mire of his scandalous 
proceedings. " Léon, ex-Comte Léon, son of the 
Emperor Napoleon! . . . ." so, on the walls of 
Paris, writ large so that all might read, he advertised 
his bastardy, eager for the notoriety that was a 
mania with him. " The bastards of heroes have no 
need to be legitimated to inherit their glory ; that 



FATHER AND SON 223 

depends on themselves," said one of Napoleon's 
secretaries. It was in an unexpected fashion that 
Léon claimed the heritage of his father's fame. He 
supplemented Austerlitz with Sainte-Pélagie, St. 
Helena with the Police Court ! There is a well- 
known epigram, which, if it was not made for Léon, 
suits him to a T, to wit, — His father took capitals, 
he took in capitalists. 



CHAPTER IV 

DEEPENING SHADOWS— ILL-REPUTE 
AND OBLIVION 

Léon and his cousin the President of the Republic — Louis 
Napoleon has 7iot forgotten the abortive London duel — 
The secret clauses of Napoleon's will executed in Leon's 
favour — Money matters again — A beggar and a borrower — 
A Correggio on agate — Léon wants to marry — He weds 
his gardener's daughter — Éléonore in later life — A widow — 
Is reconciled with her son — Her death — Léon under the 
Second Empire — Beginning of the end — Settles at Pontoise 
— Dies in poverty and neglect — The family history after his 
death — His grave not to be found; no trace left in the 
cemetery of Pontoise. 

On the hoardings of Saint-Denis, in March 1848, 
we see the son of Napoleon announcing proudly : 
" Never shall you behold me voting for the re- 
establishment of any Dynasty in France." Well, 
it was a political promise, and we know what 
promises of the sort are worth in France. It is 
pretty generally allowed that such-like engagements 
go for little or nothing. How many inviolable 
pledges have we seen broken ! Léon was not the 
man to signalize himself by a useless and quixotic 
loyalty to his oath. Two years afterwards, almost 



POLITICAL PROMISES 225 

to the day, he was all eagerness to congratulate 
his cousin Louis Napoleon on his elevation to the 
Presidency of the Republic. It was not yet, of 
course, the re-establishment of a Dynasty, the 
Dynasty of his father the Emperor, but it was a 
step towards it. Pending its accomplishment, 
Léon deemed it a point of honour to present his 
felicitations to the new Head of the State. True, 
there stood between them the old story of the 
Wimbledon duel, the episode of the two insolent 
letters of 1840; but there, what was that but the 
small change of a youthful peccadillo ? He had 
leisure to think things over when, a few days later, 
he received, in answer to his request for an audience, 
the following unequivocal reply : — 

"Private Cabinet of the President of the Republic, 
Palace of the Elysée, the 30 March 1850. 

** Sir, — The President of the Republic would 
have wished to give you audience and receive from 
yourself the assurances of devotion which you offer 
him in writing ; but the number and the importance 
of his engagements have prevented him. He is 
desirous, however, that you should know how much 
he appreciates the step you have taken and the 
motives which inspired you to take it. He bids 
me assure you of this and express his regrets. 

"Accept, Sir, I beg, the assurance of my very 
distinguished consideration, 

" MOQUARD, 

Chief Secretary. " 
15 



226 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

It was a flat refusal to see him, wrapped up in 
polite language. He was denied admission to the 
Elysée in 1850, and was equally excluded, on the 
re-establishment of the Empire, from the Tuileries. 
He saw now that the London affair had left its 
impression on Napoleon's memory, for of course, 
there was no doubt about it in his mind, it was not 
the notorious scandals of his life, but simply the 
duel of 1840, that closed against him the doors 
which, in the days when the Other, the first 
Emperor, was at the Tuileries, he had passed 
through in his nurse's arms. A cruel blow, an 
unmerited punishment ! What ! the new Emperor 
bore him so rancorous, so obstinate a grudge, — 
him of all people who only asked to serve him as 
Préfet, or Councillor of State, or under any other 
uniform resplendent with gold lace ! " Electors, 
never will youseeme vote the re-establishment of any 
Dynasty in France ! . . ." True, he had said so ; 
but then the posters had long ago disappeared from 
the walls of Saint-Denis they decorated. Ah ! if 
only that London business likewise could have 
vanished in the abyss of electoral engagements ! 
For years Léon had bitterly regretted it. Still 
remembering this fiasco of the duel, he wrote to 
his brother, the Comte Walewski, another of 
Napoleon's natural sons : " I have cruelly expiated 
my fault by the deprivation, for so many years now, 
of the honour of entry to His Majesty's presence. 



NAPOLEON III. INEXORABLE 227 

I live in hopes, my dear Walewski, that the 
Emperor's generosity will forgive me this wrong, 
which I would fain atone by putting my whole life 
at his service. My duty is to serve the Emperor. 
The voice of my conscience leaves me no rest. 
The inaction to which I am condemned by his 
silence is a veritable torture. I will beseech His 
Majesty to put an end to my long exile. I have 
vigour enough and energy enough worthily to 
fulfil whatever function should be entrusted to me ; 
my devotion to the Emperor and his Dynasty will 
never alter." The regret he expresses was belated ; 
may I be allowed to suggest it was not altogether 
disinterested ? Anyway, the Emperor remained 
inexorable. Moquard, whom the Comtesse de 
Luxbourg met one day in the Bois de Boulogne, 
confessed to her that it was in fact his recollection 
of the 1840 duel that dictated to Napoleon in. his 
resolution not to receive Léon. He added : "His 
Majesty will never receive him ; tell your son so. " 
In the end, the Emperor himself defined his 
attitude to a General who, acting on behalf of 
Leon's mother, consulted him on the matter : " Tell 
Madame la Comtesse de Luxbourg," he said, "that 
I shall put no obstacle in the way of your son's 
just claims on the State, but leave the rest alone, 
General ; I cannot forget the London affair." The 
Emperor was adamant. 

The Government was inexorable, — and the 



228 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

scarcity of cash inexorable too. Money was the 
thing ! Léon was harder up than ever. He must 
have money, and plenty of it. Was not money 
owing to him, and big sums too ? For instance, — 
the 300,000 francs of the codicil in the Emperor's 
will. From 1849 he began energetic efforts to 
secure its payment. To the President of the 
Republic he addressed an open letter, in which he 
wrote : " Patience is a great virtue ; for twenty 
years I have given evidence of its possession. All 
this is serious. Monsieur le President ; you must 
not forget it ! The glorious blood of the Emperor 
flows in my veins, his nephew is Head of the 
State ; shall I obtain amends, shall I get justice 
done ? " The thing was serious, particularly for 
his purse, — the more so as the calculations he 
had made figured out the legacy of his Imperial 
father at a largely increased capital sum. On July 
7, 1853, Léon estimated that the State was in- 
debted to him in the sum of 872,670 francs, repre- 
senting capital and interest of the amount appor- 
tioned to him by the Emperor by his decrees of 
April 30, May 8 and 31, 181 5, on the sale of the 
State Forests in the Moselle district. The follow- 
ing year his claim was more or less satisfied. By 
a decree of August 5, Napoleon iii. directed the 
testamentary dispositions of the First Emperor's 
will to be carried out. Leon's share, originally 
fixed by the father at 300,000 francs, was cut down 



A WINDFALL 



229 



by the nephew to 255,319 francs in stock at 3 per 
cent., the capital sum, barring Hfe interest, of which 
was given to Walewski. The official organ, the 
Monitetir, had qualms about publishing the facts of 
this generosity. In its pages Léon was designated 
by a periphrasis, as will be seen by the appended 
extract from the decree of May 5, 1885, fixing the 
apportionment of the St. Helena legacies: — 



Names 

of the 

Legatees. 


Total 

of the 

Legacies. 


Amounts 
received in 
Capital and 

Interest. 


Difference 
between the 

Amounts 
received and 
the Total of 
the Legacies. 


Amounts 

to receive 

according to 

Decree. 


To the 
Ward of 
M e n e- 
V a 1 ' s 
father- 
in-law. 


300,000 




300,000 


255.319 



The Ward of MenevaF s father-in-law! A tact- 
ful way out of a delicate situation ! And the 
authorities showed not only tact, but worldly wisdom 
into the bargain. From tliis capital sum of 255,319 
francs, 45,000 was kept back to satisfy various 
creditors of Leon's, while the balance served to 
provide him with an annuity of 10,000 francs, with 
the express stipulation that on his death without 
children the 210,000 francs should revert to the 
Comte Walewski. A yearly allowance of 10,000 
francs ! Meagre pabulum for the voracious swallow 



230 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

of this knight of industry, even though, in the 
preceding June, the Tuileries had already paid 
some of his debts, to the tune of 7202 francs 50. 
Live on that? The problem seemed insoluble, 
especially as he had great calls on his income. 

His first step after benefiting by the new 
Emperor's generosity was to demand, June 11, 
1852, 20,000 francs to pay his expenses to Rome. 
For a pleasure trip ? Oh dear no ! — for the 
execution of "important plans." These "plans" 
he had already carried out in part when, April 10, 
1850, he went to Rome to deposit Coessin's books 
at the Monastery of the Holy Apostles. Needless 
to say, the authorities turned a deaf ear, this time, 
to his application. It was at the period when the 
" Société Pacifique " was in full swing. On February 
I, 1855, at the office of Maître Bergeon, depositary 
of Coessin's famous testamentary dispositions, Léon, 
in conjunction with a man of letters by name Joseph- 
Jean-Baptiste Charbonnel, registered the deed con- 
stituting the commercial society of the " Children 
of God." In concert with the " Société Pacifique," 
it was to purchase, to establish its headquarters 
there, the whilom Hôtel Bonaparte, in the Rue de 
la Victoire, the house from which Napoleon i., " then 
Consul (sic) set forth to carry out the cozcp détat of 
18 Brumaire." This was how at that date we see 
the son writing his father's history ! This scheme 
proved still-born, like so many others ; for, Léon 



THE "CHILDREN OF GOD" 231 

explains, "the time was not come" and " I stopped 
the combination." I am far from blaming him. 

For the time being this failure left him with 
time on his hands. Instantly he seized the 
opportunity to open, on May 25, 1853, an ink 
manufactory on the Île-Saint-Denis, Quai de la 
Seine, No. 27. The management of this he com- 
bined with that of a scheme for the re-afforesting 
and general clearing of such Departments as con- 
tained uncultivated areas. In addition, from his 
study table, he solved the Italian question, perfected 
submarine navigation, and, what is more, patented 
the famous lamp " with revolving stand," Coessin's 
miraculous invention. Disaster quickly overtook 
him. In a very short time our man had not a 
penny to bless himself with, and this indefatigable 
"bleeder of purses" was on the war-path again. 
The era of loans began afresh. Like Gourgaud, 
like all the rest, Walewski let himself be milked. 
But he was determined to stop at that, for, when 
appealed to for a personal interview, he contented 
himself with answering : — 

Paris, the 30 September 1885. 
" I regret that my engagements do not allow 
me to see you for the present. As for the three 
triflino- sums I have been so fortunate as to have 
it in my power to advance you, do not trouble 
yourself, I beg ; it will be time enough to repay 
them later on. 



232 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

" Accept the expression of all proper sentiments 
on my part. A. Walewski." 

The most amazing part of the whole thing is 
surely to see Léon himself publishing these damag- 
ing letters where impatience, disgust and contempt 
can so plainly be read between the lines. But 
little recked he of that, and on Walewski's repulsing 
him, made for the Emperor, who also had not 
proved obdurate against all his previous demands 
for money. In August 1857, Léon tried to borrow 
3000 francs of him. Refusal, — and right about 
face ! On November 1 7 following, he asked 
Prince Napoleon for a loan of 10,000 francs, to pay 
his debts with. Another refusal, — whether to see 
him or lend him money. Almost the same day 
Walewski received the same cool request. Refusal 
again. Same demand made to Morny. Morny 
answered courteously : " Unfortunately I myself 
have many obligations to meet which render it 
impossible for me to make any advance whatever." 

But lo ! to relieve the monotony, I suppose, 
Léon finds another "affair" on his hands. In 
1 83 1 a M. Cartier, an engineer, had formed a 
Company for building a railroad to the Belgian 
frontier by way of Beauvais, Amiens, Arras, and 
Lille. The concession had been promised him by 
the Thiers Ministry, and Léon, allured by the 
project, had provided all the funds for the pre- 
liminary plans. In 1838 Cartier died, and in 1845 



A CORREGGIO 233 

Rothschild obtained the concession that had been 
guaranteed to the engineer. Léon is up in arms, 
shouting and protesting, accusing the Ministry of 
Public Works of nothing less than stealing his 
plans. In 1857 he entered a suit, alleging this and 
claiming payment of 500,000 francs damages. 

Meantime, pending the hearing of the case, a 
man must live. So he disposes of his family 
treasures. In 1834, coming out from his Episcopal 
Mass, his uncle, Cardinal Fesch, had made him a 
present of a picture from his celebrated gallery. It 
was a Correggio, on agate, framed in copper gilt 
and enclosed in a fine case of ^reen morocco leather. 
It represented an angel offering the cup to Our 
Lord in the Garden. For years Fesch had lived 
in terror of seeing this masterpiece carried off by 
the Emperor for the Louvre collections. He had 
put it on an easel in his bedroom, and to anyone 
who admired it, he used to say : "It never leaves me. 
I have it always under my eye. Else I should be 
too much afraid he mio-ht have it off me." He 
having spared it, it was his son who got it. As 
early as 1838, " in presence of pecuniary embarrass- 
ments," he had tried to sell it, and had offered it for 
40,000 francs to Queen Amélie. But at that price 
people found they could do without a Correggio, and 
willy-nilly Léon had to keep it. In 1840 a lender 
advanced him 600 francs on the article, which was 
recovered in 1855 by the intervention of the avoué 



234 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

Boudin, who was entrusted with the settlement of 
Leon's money matters at the time the legacies of 
the Emperor's will were liquidated. On May i, 
1858, he decided to offer it to Prince Napoleon, and 
wrote to him : — 

" Having a pressing need of money at present 
to satisfy some creditors who are dunning me un- 
mercifully and to meet the expenses of my marriage, 
which it is of importance to carry through as soon as 
possible in order to legitimate my two boys, I should 
like to sell this picture, though it bears in my eyes a 
priceless value because of the donor, and though I 
should greatly regret to part with it. I am therefore 
going to offer it to you. Prince, and to make it easy 
for you to acquire it, I fix the price at 25,000 francs." 

Word of honour ! Twenty-five thousand francs 
was giving it away ! Still even this alluring 
reduction did not appeal to the " Philippe Egalité of 
the family," who, on May 3, politely declined his 
cousin's offer, in spite of the creditable motives that 
dictated it. 

Yes, Léon was anxious to marry. For some 
months now he had been hankering after this 
agreeable project, for, with this same object of pro- 
viding for the wedding expenses, he was begging, 
as early as December 22, 1857, a loan of 5000 
francs of Napoleon in. (taking the same oppor- 
tunity to claim his New Year's gift), and on 
December 17, a like sum from Rothschild. But the 



MARRIED 235 

two potentates turned a deaf ear, which caused the 
marriage to be postponed. The prospective bride, 
a Mile Jonet (Françoise-Fanny), was born at 
Brussels on January 14, 1831, daughter of Maxi- 
milien Jonet and Marie Wirin-Jacquemau. Her 
father had been the Comte Leon's gardener at the 
Ile-Saint-Denis, which very naturally had led him 
to adopt a kindly attitude towards the gardener's 
daughter. In 1853 he was living with her in 
rooms rented in the name of Mme Jonet, 
so that, when one fine day the furniture was 
seized by the bailiffs, the aforesaid Mme Jonet had 
to appeal to the Court of Adjudications to make 
good her claim to the goods. Such are the tricks 
of troublesome creditors, and such the wiles of 
dishonest debtors. 

As outcome of the relations between this lady 
and our hero — the latter admits the fact without a 
trace of embarrassment — were born two sons. The 
elder, Charles, had seen the light at Saint-Denis 
on October 25, 1855 ; the younger, Gaston, in 
Paris (xiith Arrondissement), on June i, 1857. 
The Emperor, applied to in their favour, granted 
each of them an allowance of iioo francs. They 
were destined to wait some years more before 
their civil status was put on a proper footing, 
their mother not having been legally married to 
their father till 1865, at the Mairie of the xviiith 
Arrondissement. At last Napoleon iii. had given 



236 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

way ; between January and July 1865 he had given 
orders to pay to his would-be assassin of other 
days the sum of 60,000 francs, — a bagatelle, a drop 
in the bucket, to use phrases that seem specially 
invented to express Leon's frame of mind. The 
present only whetted his appetite, and, amusing to 
relate, so far infected the new Mme Léon with the 
same spirit that she too started begging, first doles 
of 5000 to 6000 francs, then orders for a Belgian 
mine in which she held an interest, then bursaries for 
her boys at the Collège Sainte-Barbe, then . . . 
But there, why go on ? — Still, we must add one 
example more, to complete the list: in 1869 we 
find Léon asking the concession for the railway 
from Tours to Montluçon. The business of the 
Northern railways had not sickened him of specula- 
tion in railroad construction. 

1869 ! ... A year before this date he had lost 
his mother, the bright young beauty of the Con- 
sulate, the pretty pet of Mme Campan's fascinating 
flock. On the morrow of her husband's retirement, 
October i , 1 846, she had accompanied him to Austria. 
Their resources, if we are to credit a contemporary 
witness, a biased one it is true, were on a modest 
scale. They had no income, it seems, beyond the 
22,000 francs annuity they owed to the generosity 
and fond remembrance of Napoleon. Still, they 
must have possessed some influence as well, for 
Luxbourg, though now over sixty, asked for a post 



ÉLÉONORE DE LUXBOURG 237 

in the diplomatie service, and got it. Did he really 
require it then in order to keep up the expensive 
mode of life he was used to? Anyway, on May i, 
1847, he was posted Bavarian Ambassador at 
Vienna. Doubtless he must have been planning for 
the future, thinking of the welfare of the daughter 
he had by Êléonore. The declining years of the 
Luxbourg pair were enlivened by the fresh young 
graces of the girl. Amélie, born at Dresden on 
November 3, 1825, was married shortly before her 
father's appointment to Vienna. On February 11, 
1847, at Munich, she wedded the Baron Krafft 
Maximilian Ernest Franz Christian Désiré-Wilhelm- 
Ludwig von Crailsheim, Lord of Amerang and 
Alten-Hohenhau, then twenty-six years of age and 
afterwards to become Chamberlain to the King of 
Bavaria and Knight Companion of the Order of 
St. John.^ The Crailsheims came from Franconia ; 
we find mention made of them as early as 1235, 
and from 171 3 they bore the title of Baron. 
Amelie's married life lasted only a few years ; on 
August 3, 1856, she died at Amerang, leaving three 
children, all living at the present time.^ She 

1 Born at Riigland, March 22, 182 1, the husband of Amélie 
de Luxbourg died on July 4, 1892, at Anspach. — Communicated 
by M. Joachim Kiihn. 

2 They are : Maria, born at Amerang, December 20, 1847, 
married at Munich, June 4, 1872, to the Ritter Franz von Wille, 
now General of Brigade, retired, residing at Wiirzburg ; Clemen- 
tina, born at Amerang, November 1 7, 1848, at the present moment 



238 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

followed her father to the grave at less than a 
month's interval. The Comte de Luxbourg, who, 
October i, 1849, had finally retired from service, 
had gone, in July 1856, to take the waters at the 
Baths of Achselmaunstein, in Bavaria. There he 
was attacked by pleurisy, which rapidly carried 
him off, on July 10, at nightfall.^ His remains 
were carried to Amerang and laid in the family 
tomb, a building in a very fine Gothic style.^ 
Underneath his arms, the epitaph sets forth as 
follows : — 

" Here lies the Duke Frédéric de Luxbourg, 
Ambassador and Councillor of the King ; born in 
1783, died in 1856. 



# 

" Second Epistle of St. Paul to the Corinthians, 
ch. V. verse 10 : ' For we must all appear before the 
judgment seat of Christ ; that every one may receive 
the things done in his body, according to that he 
hath done, whether it be good or bad.' 

# * 

Sister of Charity at Beyrout (Syria) ; and Krafft Anton Maxi- 
milian, born at Amerang, May 10, 1852, Lord of Amerang, a 
demesne of 420 hectares, in Upper Bavaria, present head of the 
branch of Riigland Crailheim, having issue four children. — 
Communicaled by M. Joachim Kuhn. 

^ From the register of deaths for 1856, and communicated by 
Herr Franz Hellmath, Chaplain of the Catholic Parish of St. 
Nicholas, at Reichenhall. 

2 Extracted from the registers of the church of Amerang, and 
communicated by Herr Joseph Witting, Curé and Rector of 
Amerang. 



A LONE WIDOW 239 

" Happy are they which are dead in God, pre- 
destined by the Father." 

Eléonore made haste to quit the scenes of her 
twofold bereavement, and the tomb where, within 
the space of a few days, her husband and her 
daughter had inherited the peace of the grave. Of 
all she had loved, what was left her now in this 
foreign land of Bavaria, where her only remaining 
task was to decide on her future plans ? There 
was nothing to keep her there or to console her 
sorrow. At Paris her sister Zulma at any rate was 
left her, as also her son, Léon, the man who had 
publicly slandered her name, but who was her son, 
her child, her last hope. Thej'e was all that re- 
mained henceforth of her past. Her father was 
dead long ago, on March 26, 1821 ; her mother had 
disappeared ; Revel was no more, and she felt 
herself horribly alone. She returned to France 
and made overtures to her son. On July 15, 1858, 
after law proceedings that had lasted seven years, 
and a painful struggle that had dragged on for 
seventeen, she was reconciled with him. She was 
an old woman now, bent, broken, faded, all trace of 
beauty vanished, and seventy-one years old ! Ten 
years more she had to live, a life of old-time 
memories, — and what memories ! Beside a 
husband whose daily bread came from the 22,000 
francs annuity conferred on her by an Imperial lover, 
she, the former mistress of Napoleon, the divorced 



240 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

wife of Revel, the widow of Augier, had Hved and 
grown old. What grim pictures must have risen 
before her mind's eye, called up by these ancient 
memories ! And the Emperor ? She had not loved 
him ; she had submitted to his passing caprice and 
reaped her reward, but doubtless to her, as to some 
farce- writer of the Empire, he was still only "a 
little fat man with a common look." This amour 
of a day, this passion of an hour, had been the 
calamity of her life, — but its one lucky chance too. 
What scandalous scenes, with Revel, with Léon, 
all spring from this furtive and fugitive liaison ! 
What bitter draughts drained from a gilded cup ! 
Of all this, of all this past, she was nothing now 
but the poor, stricken, broken ghost. Yonder, in 
the Cemetery of Père-Lachaise, beside the moss- 
grown pyramid under which Volney sleeps, her 
grave was waiting for her. A long, heavy slab, on 
which years ago had been cut in the stone : — 

t 

ICI REPOSENT : 

DOMINIQUE 

DENUELLE DELAPLAIGNE 

DÉCÉDÉ LE 26 MARS I 82 I 

À l'Âge de 72 ans. 

So far her father's was the only name there ; 
but she who had persisted so obstinately in living on 
and surviving all her friends, she too was presently 
to mingle her ashes with his. At last the end came, 



PÈRE-LACHAISE 241 

and on January 30, 1868, she died, at No. 20 
Boulevard Malesherbes. She was borne to Père- 
Lachaise and laid beside her father. By her sister 
Zulma's care the time-worn slab was inscribed with 
a second epitaph : — 

LOUISE-CATHERINE- ÉLÉONORE 

DENUELLE DELAPLAIGNE 

VEUVE DE CHARLES-AUGUSTE, COMTE DE LUXBOURG, 

DÉCÉDÉE LE 30 JANVIER 1868 

À l'Âge de 79 ans. 

But a space was still left to fill on the grave- 
stone ; a place was still left to take beneath it. 
Zulma was not long in following her sister and 
adding another to complete the inscriptions : — 

ALEXANDRINE-LOUISE-ZULMA 

DENUELLE DELAPLAIGNE 
DÉCÉDÉE LE 27 AVRIL 1880 

À l'Âge de 72 ans. 

— to which the stone-cutter's chisel added the 
finishing touch : — 

de profundis 

"concession à PERPÉTUITÉ." 

Thus Léon was left the solitary survivor, to face 
the law proceedings arising out of the division of 
his mother's property. While these were still un- 
completed and Zulma's interests still in litigation, 

came the Emperor's fall, and the Commune raised 
16 



2 42 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

its red flag in blazing Paris. Léon gave up his 
rooms in Paris and escaped to London. There he 
took up his abode in modest London lodgings at 
Camden Town, and, to pay his way, set about selling 
the last remaining Imperial relics in his possession. 
It was under these circumstances he disposed of a 
portrait-bust of Mme Mère to Madame Tussaud's 
Collection. After the Peace he returned to France 
and went to live at Toulouse. This was in 1875. 
The Empire was gone, the Emperor gone, — and 
with them his income. He had still by him 
some miniature paintings in handsome ornamental 
cases. They were erotic subjects, and he attributed 
them, I cannot say with what degree of probability, 
to Titian and Correggio. He said they came from 
Napoleon, but though the cases bore the Imperial 
arms, he failed to find a collector to buy them for 
his "special" cabinet. Old and sickly, he was 
on the direct road to the depths of destitution. 
His creditors had left off summoning him before the 
Courts save now and then to settle old accounts for 
the most part irrecoverable through lapse of time. 
So, on May 13, 1874, his name came to the fore for 
the last time in the Civil Courts, when a Mme 
Tourillon, a dressmaker, sued him for payment of 
the balance of a bill of 6373 francs. 

He was living like a hermit now at Pontoise, 
which he had chosen as the last but one of his 
innumerable dwelling-places. Of all these, whether 




Count Léon in Old Age. 



BEGINNING OF THE END 243 

the homes of his early splendour or the haunts of 
his subsequent misery, it is well-nigh impossible to 
frame a list. Beginning with 1832, when he dwelt 
in the Rue Saint-Honoré, No. 370, we find him : in 
1836, living in the Rue Taitbout, No. 15 ; in 1845, 
in the Rue Joubert, No. 3 ; in 1848, at No. 9 of the 
same street, from which he removes to No. 63 Rue 
de Provence, in the Cité d'Antin. In 1849 he 
dates his letters from No. 10 Rue Saint-Thomas- 
du-Louvre and No. 9 Boulevard des Italiens ; in 
1850 he is playing the lord and master on his 
property on the Ile-Saint-Denis, Quai de Sèvres, 
No. 18^; in 1857 he has decamped to the Rue 
Saint- Antoine, No. 163 ; in 1861 he has cHmbed 
to Montmartre, Rue de l'Empereur, No. 31. It 
is next door to impossible to track him down and 
follow him through all these chops and changes till 
the day when he finally settles at Pontoise, at the 
Villa Davenport in the Rue de 1' Hermitage. Even 
there he is only a flying visitor, very soon removing 
to the Rue de Beaujon, to a house belonging to a 
M. Fleury, who lives himself at Vallangoujard, 

This is his last stage. The room that he makes 
his final refuge is adorned with four portraits of 
Napoleon, — " my glorious father ! " — with a painting 
showing Eléonore in all the brilliancy of her youth- 

1 This property was sold by order of the Court in 1872. — 
Intermédiaire des chercheurs et des curieux; lo décembre 1891 ; 
col. 972. 



244 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

ful beauty, and a picture where he is represented, 
he, Léon, with waving cloak and bold, laughing 
looks, a romantic and picturesque figure. Before 
the chimney-piece he sets a screen of tapestry, the 
work of Éléonore's fair hands, — all that was left him 
of his mother's heritage. Such is the home where, 
for a few months more, he is condemned to the 
torments of memory in atonement for his sins. 
'* When I was a dandy with curled locks ! . . . " 
sighed Lord Byron in his days of decadence, — and 
Léon may well have made the same lament at sight 
of the gay and sprightly image of what he once 
was. He is old and broken ; his seventy-five years 
weigh heavy on his shoulders. Yet it is this hour 
Nature has chosen to impress most strongly on his 
pale and faded features the likeness to the prisoner 
of St. Helena. The finger of eld accentuates the 
resemblance, and the nearer approaches the term 
of his existence, the more noticeable does the 
Napoleonic cast of the features become. This wreck 
of humanity grows half majestic with its white locks ; 
his past is all a thing of the past, — its follies, its 
shady manoeuvres, its dubious contrivances ; he 
is the Emperor's son. But to what depths he has 
fallen ! The old man's shirts are in rags ; he cannot 
afford clean linen, he must forgo tobacco ! Yes, he 
pays a cruel price for the escapades of other days ! 
As he sits beside his dying fire, what pictures 
memory calls up in the ashes ! But not for long, 



DIES IN POVERTY 245 

not for long ! The hour is come for him too to 
begone, to rejoin the dead of his line, to vanish from 
the earth and close the romance of his illustrious 
birth. 

On April 14, 1 881, at ten in the morning, he 
died of a bowel complaint. At the Mairie, where 
his son Gaston and Fleury, his landlord, go to 
notify his decease, the official puts him down as 
"gentleman," and describes him as the "sieur Le 
Comte (Léon)." His birth certificate was a strange 
one enough, and his death certificate is equally 
curious. Without pomp or ceremony he was laid 
in a pauper's grave among the poor and needy. 
His only memorial was a grassy mound and a little 
black wooden cross that soon rotted and fell to 
pieces. Presently came a day when his unremem- 
bered bones were robbed of their six feet of earth 
to make room for others more fortunate. For a dozen 
years the Comte Leon's grave has been unrecog- 
nizable. Who ever dreamed of making pious 
pilgrimage thither ? His relatives ? Not likely ! 
On the morrow of his death, his widow, in the direst 
straits of poverty, became sick-nurse and house- 
keeper with a Mme Dulauri, once cook in the 
household of Piétri, Prefect of Police under the 
Empire. The compassion of a neighbour, Mme 
Greffe, wife of an insurance agent, guaranteed her 
against the horrors of starvation. As for the sons, 
Charles and Gaston, they had long ago gone to 



246 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

push their fortunes elsewhere. Charles, Corporal 
in the i6th Regiment of Mounted Chasseurs at 
Vendôme in 1875, married seven years after his 
father's death, on December 27, 1888, at Saint- 
Germain-en- Laye, the Baronne d'Elegert. Going 
out to Venezuela to exploit some iron mines, he died 
at Caraccas in August 1894. Gaston, settled as 
Commercial Agent at La Rochelle, canvassed in 
1890 the suffrages of the Paris electors, under the 
patronage of M. Maurice Barrés. " For our part," 
says the author of Un Ennemi des lois, "we can 
remember having made strong representations to 
General Boulanger in favour of a candidate recom- 
mended, not to mention other qualifications, by the 
fabulous splendour of his origin." But M. Gaston 
Léon was no more fortunate with the electors of 
Paris than his father had formerly been with those 
of Saint- Denis. Léon ? What did the name mean 
to the Paris of 1890 ? 

Besides these two sons, born previously to his 
marriage with Mile Jonet, the Comte Léon had 
subsequently had two other children, — Fernand, 
who went off to America and came back to 
France a few years ago as chief man of the 
Buffalo Bills, and Charlotte, born in 1867, who 
married M. Mesnard. After her father's death, 
on the recommendation of the Curé of Pontoise, 
M. Driot, and of a charitable lady devoted to good 
works, Mile de Boisbrenay, Charlotte Léon was 



A PAUPER'S GRAVE 247 

brought up at the Convent of the " Dames de la 
Compassion." The training she there received 
enabled her to enter the teaching profession and 
begin her career as mistress of the Communal 
Girls' School at Boghari in Algeria. Her mother, 
the Comtesse Léon, lived with her and accompanied 
her back to France when she was recalled to take 
up a similar post at Vitz-sur-Authie in the Depart- 
ment of the Somme. It was there the daughter 
of the Belgian gardener, and later daughter-in-law of 
Napoleon the Great, died on March 12, 1899, at 
four in the morning. Eventually Mme Mesnard 
was appointed to duties nearer the capital, and after 
teaching for a while at Bry-sur-Marne, was given 
a post in Paris. The Bonapartes always showed 
an interest in this granddaughter of the Emperor, 
and the expenses of her children's education were 
defrayed by Prince Roland Bonaparte. 

Here ends the wonderful and woeful history of 
the Emperor's "unknown son." 

Nay, humble cemetery of Pontoise, I will not 
visit thee to wander among thy modest graves 
and thy lowly dead ; I will not trample thy dust 
to seek the phantom of him whose ashes are 
mingled with thy soil. His name, if cried within 
thy walls, would rouse no echo ; the grey shadows 
of thy pleasant country greenery are sacred to such 
as have passed away less unfortunately. His death 



248 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

formed the climax of a grim atonement ; it was 
twice wretched, — wretched in its circumstances and 
wretched in the sepulture that followed it. To this 
everlasting wanderer, this restless hot-head, this 
insatiable adventurer, was denied the repose of 
eternity in an inviolate corner of God's acre. I 
marvel at the ways of fate. The graveyard was 
for him what the two Empires of the two 
Napoleons were for them, — a promised land from 
which he was driven forth almost ere he had 
entered it. Heraldry rejected from her blazons 
this coat charged with the bar sinister of bastards of 
high degree ; thou, O Death, over this dishonoured 
corse, didst trace the bar of thy reprobation. Nay, 
lonely, rustic cemetery, I will not visit thee, for 
here, in Paris, I know where to find the tall, 
rustling yew that trembles in the clear air above 
the tomb of the tender, amorous Éléonore. 



APPENDIX 

ADDITIONS AND SUPPLEMENTARY 
DOCUMENTS 



249 



I 



ROGUE REVEL, THE MORAL LEGATEE OF 
THE EMPEROR 

In an earlier chapter (Bk. I. Ch. IV.), I have shown how 
Revel found means to claim an allowance from the funds 
settled by the Emperor on the Comte Léon. I have 
named the grounds on which the rogue of Year XIII relied to 
demand a share in Napoleon's generosity. These grounds 
are so extraordinary and unlikely, that it is well for the 
historian to supplement the account of this improbable 
adventure with the original documents that form the 
evidence. No more cruel revelation of Revel's mentality 
can well be. These documents form a little collection 
apart found among Meneval's papers. The first is a letter 
addressed to Napoleon's Secretary by Revel at the moment 
when, sentenced by every Penal and nonsuited in every 
Civil Court, he was endeavouring to make something out 
of his silence, which he offered to sell, and which already 
on a preceding occasion Leon's first guardian, the Baron 
de Mauvières, had not assessed at a very high figure. I 
repeat, the document in question is a veritable curiosity ; 
in it we find nothing more nor less than Revel actually 
posing as the moral legatee of the exile of St. Helena. 
We have seen him already as sharper, peculator, and 
betrayed husband ; let us now consider him in this new 
incarnation, the most amazing of all those wherein he 
shone with so brilliant a versatility. 



2 52 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 



" To M. de Meneval. 

" Monsieur le Baron, — I have signed the withdrawal 
of my appeal, and a declaration which you will look upon, 
no doubt, as very important, since it guarantees to Léon 
the position in which you desire him to remain, and which 
his mother herself will now never be able to have fixed on 
another footing, as it is her design to do. M. Gillet ^ has 
been able to assure you that this declaration was an act of 
pure devotion on my part. I made it to help carry out 
your intentions, viz., to keep Léon in independence of two 
families which covet his fortune, and which have already 
laid hands on his person. 

" My behaviour under these circumstances has not been 
disinterested, nor ought it to be. It is unquestioned that 
the Emperor made my wife his mistress; that from his 
intercourse with her was born Léon, whose guardian you 
are. The husband of this wife, stripped of all his property, 
could not be reduced to die of hunger; by endowing the 
child, the Emperor has implied that the mother's husband 
should be given his daily bread. You are the executor of 
this mental codicil ; allow me to appeal to your conscience 
to give it effect. 

" The Baron de Mauvières, your father-in-law, felt that 
compensation was due to me, and granted me 1200 francs 
a year from the minor's revenues. I need not recall to 
your memory an unfortunate dispute which arose in con- 
nexion with an advance of 300 francs to be made on the 
last quarter's payment for the year then current. I was 
at that period in danger of being turned out of my lodging ; 
the loan I asked was simply an absolute necessity; it was 
barbarously refused me. The eviction was carried out, 
and had not Heaven opened a refuge to me at Neuilly, I 

^ The Baron de Meneval's notary. 



A LETTER OF REMONSTRANCE 253 

should have had for habitation the airy vault, and for food 
the grass of the field. This state of distress was the more 
frightful, as my daughter shared it. Despair can only 
have its source in such situations ; I could not save myself 
therefrom, and that is why I persisted in my remonstrances 
with M. de Mauvières, whom you have replaced. You 
have won the case which I initiated only with the purpose 
of losing it ; but to obtain this result it has been necessary 
to tear up the pages of the Code. On appeal, I should 
not have lost again ; I had no delusions on that point. In 
the Court of Cassation my plea would have been regretted. 
, . . But I had a right to do as I am doing, — to write 
this letter, and to sell my freedom of action in order 
to live. 

" Still, this resource was only open to me at the expense 
of reputations I had no wish and no call to injure. I am 
well assured that M. de Mauvières, you, and the members 
of the Council of Administration are only the religious 
executors of a purpose that deserves all respect. You 
have been in the Emperor's service ; you guard the interests 
of his natural son ; you fulfil a praiseworthy function which 
I cannot justly find fault with. But on your side, Monsieur 
le Baron, do you not deem it just to allow that I ought not 
to die of hunger ? The manes of Napoleon demand deeds 
of generosity ; they disavow and repudiate acts of petty 
meanness. M. Gillet has only paid me 350 francs. I had 
confined myself to asking the continuance of the allow- 
ance of 1200 francs and the payment of arrears, pending 
a more favourable arrangement being dictated by your 
conscience. He dare not take the responsibility, and 
advises me to refer my claim to you. 

" I began by surrendering. I am in your power, but 
you will never treat your prisoner as the English treated 
the Great Man who threw himself confidingly into their 
arms. I have lately lost my son, whom I had brought up 
as a surveyor, and who would have been the prop of my 



2 54 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

old age. I have a daughter left, a girl attractive and 
solidly educated, of unstained character, and highly 
thought of wherever I live. My industry, enormous I 
may call it, is hindered at every step for lack of money. I 
had founded a business office at Neuilly ; it was prospering ; 
it is on the road to ruin. A quite pretty lot of furniture 
I had acquired is about to be confiscated for rent ; sundry 
household debts are killing me. 

" I only ask a little relief. You are too great-hearted 
to refuse it. You will not be stopped by a momentary 
ebullition of temper which my wounded self-respect 
justified, but which I now see was wrong, because it 
is impossible for me not to admit that the insults that 
occasioned it cannot reasonably be imputed to their 
supposed author. 

"Your guardianship is a stormy one, and may well 
become more so through the machinations of the 
Denuelle and Luxbourg families. But I will maintain 
the course of action I have taken. Count on me, sir; 
I have no motive to wish you ill. It is not so with the 
Denuelles, who have reduced me to beggary. I will be 
your auxiliary whenever you judge it fitting I should be. 
Meantime, I am with the highest esteem . . . 

"Paris, lo /tine 1823." 

The manes of Napoleon demand deeds of generosity ? 
. . . Revel a prisoner, — whose prisoner ? Meneval's ! — 
comparing himself with the Emperor in the hands of 
the English ! ... A touch of art like this is beyond 
improvement ! 

II 

However, not content with thus making his submission 
to Meneval, Revel thought fit to crave the charity of the 
members of the new Family Council appointed to look 
after Leon's affairs, and three days after the epistle above, 



''THE MANES OF THE EMPEROR" 255 

we find him sending off this supplementary begging- 
letter : — 



" To M. le Comte de Lavalette, the Comte Las-Cases, 
and the Baron Denon. 

"Gentlemen, — I have put an end to the suit in 
disproof of paternity of the boy Léon which I was 
bringing against you in your capacity as members of 
the family council of the said minor; a deed cancel- 
ling the appeal lodged by me against two judgments 
delivered by the Civil Tribunal of the Seine, and a 
declaration to the effect that I am convinced no affinity, 
actual or putative, exists between this child and my 
marriage, are deposited at the office of M. Gillet, notary. 
M. de Meneval is informed of the existence of these two 
documents, which I have executed spontaneously and 
which will, without doubt, earn me. Gentlemen, a share 
in your benevolence. 

" You are aware of the agreement I entered into 
in 1 82 1 with M. le Baron de Mauvières, at that time 
Leon's guardian, whereby I consented to suspend my 
action in disproof of paternity till the date of his ward's 
majority, in consideration of an allowance of 1200 francs 
a year. This sum, out of all proportion to the fortune I 
was saving from the hands of the Denuelle and Luxbourg 
families, should have been raised to at least triple its 
actual amount, and in all probability it would have been 
largely increased if at that time, as now, I had been willing 
to discontinue my action altogether. It is only natural 
to suppose that, if for a mere suspension of legal action 
1200 francs were allowed me, a definite discontinuance 
would have inspired much more ample indemnities. I 
have applied for an augmentation to M. de Meneval, 
but he doubtless will refer my demand to the Council, 
and it is under these circumstances that I take the 
liberty of writing to you to beg you to be favourably 



256 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

disposed. The manes of the Emperor, as I told M. 
de Meneval, demand acts of generosity towards me. 
I have faithfully served Napoleon, in spite of my 
domestic grievances with which I had to reproach 
him. My rectitude deserved something better than 
to be forgotten. It is for you to contribute to the 
ending of that under which I suffer by co-operating 
to give adequate peace of mind to an old officer, father 
of a family, the victim of an act of injustice he has 
now consented to cover with a veil. — I am, etc. . . . 
"Paris, i3/w«i; 1S23." 

Another superb touch: / have faithfully served 
Napoleofi. ... It is a sheer impossibility to better such 
naive professions as we have here. 

Ill 

Nevertheless, all these fine phrases failed to touch 
either Meneval or Lavalette or Las-Cases, not to mention 
Denon; all four observed a judicious silence. But Revel 
was not a patient mortal, and without even giving them 
time to answer, he set to work on another appeal to a 
fifth correspondent, M. Lerat de Magnitot, Jîige de Paix 
of the 2nd Arrondissement of Paris. It was under 
this Lerat de Magnitot's auspices that Leon's second 
Family Council had been constituted, and on this ground 
he was invited to preside over it. He now received 
from Revel the following cry of distress, embodied in 
a letter which forms the third of this amazing series : — 

" To M. Lerat de Magnitot, Juge de Paix of the 
2.nd Arrondisse^nent of Paris. 

" Monsieur le Juge de Paix, — The most sincere 
homage a litigant can render to the judge who tries 
his case is to appeal with a sense of confidence to his 
public and private virtues. You are not ignorant of 



A CRY OF DISTRESS 257 

my misfortunes. I have lost at one blow my wife and my 
fortune by a stroke of despotism unheard of in history. 
You will perceive by this opening that I speak of the 
cruel misadventure whereby the child Léon saw the light. 

" Weary of fruitless appeals to law, sinking ever 
deeper into the slough of poverty in proportion to the 
efforts I made to escape it, I addressed myself some 
days ago to M. Gillet, notary, to inform him of the resolu- 
tion I had taken to abandon my domestic claims on Léon, 
to restore to the Council that has the administration of 
Leon's interests a security which I could disturb, if I 
would, for a long time yet, and to put an end to the con- 
siderable expenses our suit was costing it. 

" This proposal was not at first without success. M. 
Gillet consented to let the allowance of twelve hundred 
francs a year be renewed, the same which M. de Mauvières 
had agreed to in 1821, and the only point left in suspense 
was the payment of arrears ; then M. Gillet communicated 
my proposals under this head to M. de Meneval, Leon's 
guardian at the present time. As a result of their con- 
sultation I received 350 francs instead of 1800 francs 
which are due. I continued for several days to entertain 
hopes of obtaining the balance of the amount ; and to put 
an end to the suspicions with which they unjustly regard 
me, I signed a deed undertaking to desist from the action, 
and a declaration of such a sort as to make any reopening 
of the question impossible on my part. 

" Following the advice of M. Gillet, I wrote a letter 
to M. de Meneval in which my good faith is manifest in 
every line, and v/hich M. Gillet approved. On presenting 
myself at the latter's office with the idea of receiving 
through him the answer it was only reasonable to expect, 
I heard nothing but ambiguous talk. I am not allowed 
even to hope for a reply from M. de Meneval ; in other 
words, my correspondents take a cruel pleasure in keeping 
me in an unhappy position and insulting my self-respect. 
17 



258 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

They think I ought to consider myself rich on 1000 francs 
a month, the payment of which has no sanction in writing. 
If I explain that a quite pretty set of furniture, bought 
out of my earnings, is about to be confiscated for the rent 
of my lodgings, which the payment of the arrears of an 
allowance originally fixed at a pitiful figure would enable 
me to settle, I am told it is so much the worse for me, and 
that there is nothing they can do. 

"Afflicted by this state of things, I endeavoured to 
interest the Counts de La Valette and Las-Cases and 
Baron Denon in my favour. I take the liberty of append- 
ing a copy of my circular letter to those gentlemen. If 
I am so unfortunate as to find that the language of my 
heart is misconstrued, 1 shall possess, at any rate, the con- 
solation of having acted with the simple faith of a man 
confiding in the virtues which he supposes his fellow- 
creatures to possess. 

" I repeat, Monsieur le Juge de Paix, it is as a homage 
to your merits that I address to you this confidential 
appeal. As President of the Council of Administration 
of the minor Leon's interests, and exercising a preponde- 
rating influence, both legal and moral, over the decisions 
of the other members of the Council, you will, I am 
persuaded, use these fine advantages to render less of 
an object of pity a man who deserves, I say it again, to 
escape the cruel talons of adversity. 

" I am, with profound respect, Monsieur le Juge de 
Paix, your very humble and very obedient servant, 

" Revel, 

*' Captain [retired). 
" Rue Saint-Honorê, No. 318, 

(a Baker's House), 
Paris, this Sunday, i$Jz4ne 1823." 

IV 

Did M. Lerat de Magnitot reply to this appeal ? I 
am inclined to think he did ; but if so, his answer 



PURELY PLATONIC 259 

must have been purely platonic, for that indefatigable 
penman, Revel, very soon returned to the charge. The 
week was not through before the Juge de Paix received 
a fresh letter. This time Revel pointed out plainly and 

distinctly what he expected of him : — 

" Monsieur le Juge de Paix,— I have the honour 
to send you herewith the schedule of my debts at Neuilly. 
Their total, which is not excessive for a year, will, never- 
theless, show you that the payment of arrears is indis- 
pensable. These arrears are nothing more than the con- 
tinuation of my allowance from the date I ceased to receive 
it, and have accepted it afresh. M. Gillet stated that they 
would serve to reimburse to that extent the administration 
of the minor's estate for the expenses occasioned by my 
subsequent action following on my withdrawal, but the 
suit was renewed because of the barbarous refusal of the 
modest sum of 300 francs in order to prevent my expulsion 
from the lodging I then occupied, with my daughter, at 
No. 13 Rue du Marché Saint-Honoré, and even this sum 
1 only asked for as an allowance. It was not, therefore, 
out of my own natural impulse or for ulterior ends that 
I filed my claim, but only because I found it impossible 
to calm the exasperation M. de Mauvières' hardness of 
heart caused me. I have just given palpable proof of the 
small wish I have to pursue a case which would never 
have seen the light had I been treated with the deference 
and consideration which I have a right to expect. I have 
withdrawn my appeal ; I have put in M. Meneval's hands 
a declaration which will stop my wife in the project she 
entertains of reclaiming her maternal rights over the 
minor whose person she has already taken possession of. 
I executed these deeds in simple good faith to save the 
minor from the snare into which he has fallen. I thought 
they would be grateful to me, and that I should find a 
better future under their protection. Now these papers 
are signed, I am treated as harshly as I was by M. de 



26o AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

Mauvières. I am refused arrears, without which I must 
inevitably sink again into another fit of despair, since my 
condition (which my daughter shares) will grow more 
appalling than it was when Providence offered me a refuge 
at Neuilly. M. Gillet talks of expenses which the renewal 
of the suit has caused ! I admit it has been needful to 
stuff the pockets of advocate and avoué with gold and pay 
the Court fees, but if I had gone on with the appeal, a 
sum ten times that of the modest one I lawfully claim 
would have been disbursed. In the Court of Cassation 
an advocate must have been feed to defend the said 
appeal. My withdrawal has rendered all these expenses 
unnecessary. It follows I am saving the minor's means, 
instead of forcing his Council to use his money in an un- 
profitable way. 

" It would be base to take advantage of my confidence 
to plunge me back into the wretchedness from which I 
had for a moment raised myself. It would be noble and 
generous, on the other hand, to attach to the peace which 
I have signed unconditionally an indemnity worthy of my 
sacrifice. I only went to law because I was compelled. 
I have seen good to abandon proceedings in order to leave 
in peace and quiet, honourable men whom I cannot blame 
for cherishing the memory of Napoleon in his son ; but, on 
their side, would it not be the acme of madness to torture 
unceasingly an officer the victim of a disgusting intrigue 
about which he refrains from saying a word ? Such 
conduct is a sign of folly. Let us be just ; I deserve 
attention. Napoleon committed a crime when he laid 
hands on my wife. He was guilty of a fault when he 
forgot me at his death. It is the duty of his friends to 
make good at one and the same time the crime and the 
fault. 

" If the Counts Las-Cases and de la Valette and the 
Baron Denon hearken to your voice with one accord, a 
course of action will be adopted worthy of their names 



"MORAL LEGATEE" 261 

and of yours. If you make dependent on M. de Meneval's 
decision the corresponding concession I demand in 
exchange for my extremely important ones, then the 
avoué Massion, the advocate Dupin, and their friend the 
avoué of appeal Ranté, who are still greedy for fees, will 
prevent my receiving a few crown-pieces which I ought 
never to have been forced to ask for. 

"The thing would be, Monsieur le Juge de Paix, to call 
together officially, but in a friendly spirit, the Family 
Council. At this would be held under your auspices a 
deliberation (moral, not written) that should guarantee 
me the moderate allowance that is accorded me. Your 
fatherly accents would silence passions which only money 
renders imperious. The Council would listen to reason 
which always ends by intimidating, were it only by force 
of necessity. 

" I am, with the most profound respect and deep 
gratitude, Monsieur le Juge de Paix, your very humble 
and very obedient servant, Revel, 

" Captain {pensioned by the State). 

"Rue Saint-Honorê, No. 318, 
Paris, this Sattirday, 2\ June 1823." 

" P.S. — M. Gillet refused me yesterday a fortnight of 
the allowance, coming to 50 francs. Be so good as to 
instruct him to pay me this sum, which I must have in 
order to live pending a definite decision. This trifle does 
not add anything to the allowance. Even were there no 
arrears, which your sense of justice will not allow, it would 
be a fortnight paid. M. Gillet cannot refuse to pay it me, 
as I shall be receiving it in any case for the future. The 
last instalment of 350 francs which I received on account 
has been spent on purchases of articles of prime necessity 
and in payment for current expenses of the same nature." 

In the above letter we see Revel laying it down in 
direct and peremptory language that, though forgotten in 
the St. Helena testamentary dispositions, he is none the 



262 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

less a moral legatee under Napoleon's will. However, he 
failed to convince M. Lerat de Magnitot, who the next 
day forwarded the whole budget of papers to the Baron 
de Meneval, together with the following letter, which closes 
the correspondence : — 

V 

" Rue d'Antin, No. 3, Hôtel de la Mairie, 
Paris, the 22 Jtme 1823." 

The Juge de Paix of t] te S eco7id Arrondissement. 

" Sir, — I have the honour to forward you enclosed two 
letters which I have received in succession from M. Revel, 
with a copy of those which he appears to have written to 
the Counts de Las-Cases and de La Valette and Baron 
Denon. To the last of these is appended a summary and 
informal schedule of the present state of his debts, of which, 
it seems, he solicits the payment, independently of the 
350 francs which he has previously received, and to which 
M. Gillet, notary, will, at my request, have perhaps added 
50 francs for a fortnight due of the annual indemnity of 
1200 francs agreed upon, so it appears, verbally . . . 
(illegible). Will you, sir, make this further sacrifice for 
the sake of peace? Shall it be deducted from the total of 
the sum demanded ? Shall it be paid direct or by a third 
hand? 

" Perfectly in accord as I am with the members of the 
Council on the points which we have had to discuss at the 
meetings held under my presidency, convinced as much as 
you are of the strict procedure necessary to be observed 
with M. Revel, there are at the same time, I am well 
aware, sir, decisions on questions of domestic management 
with which I must necessarily remain unconnected so long 
as I am not directly called upon, under any special 
circumstances that may arise, to consider them. Accord- 
ingly, in spite of M. Revel's suggestion, I shall certainly 
refrain from calling together, either officially or even 



«THE STAMP OF THEIR AUTHOR" 263 

informally, at my office a meeting quite unobjectionable 
in itself no doubt, but which would not perhaps meet with 
your approval, unless its necessity has been proved to my 
satisfaction as being to your interest and that of your 
ward. The latter, I am told, has found means to escape 
from his school to finish his education somewhere on the 
banks of the Rhine ; but probably I am misinformed. In 
any case, the governance of his personal acts concerns, of 
course, only his guardian and subrogate-guardian. 

Under whatever circumstances, these or any others, 
I shall always be happy, sir, to have an opportunity of 
renewing to you the assurance of the sentiments of 
distinguished consideration with which I have the honour 
to be, your very humble and very obedient servant, 

"Le Rat de Magnitot. 

" P.S. — Would you be so kind, sir, as to return me 
these papers when you have perused them? You will 
agree with me, I do not doubt, they bear the stamp of 
their author." 

The reader will think so too. 



II 

NAPOLEON AS A FATHER IN MYTH 
AND LEGExND 

The Emperor had two natural sons, — the Comte Léon 
and the Comte Walewski, the second the son of Mme 
Walewska, whose romantic and sentimental history I 
shall doubtless one day write. The birth of these two is 
officially certified, and admits of no doubt as to parentage. 
They are the only natural children that can be attributed, 
with proofs to support the contention, to Napoleon. But 
this was far from satisfying the love of the fabulous innate 
in mankind, and there are legends in overflowing abund- 
ance attributing such a crowd of offspring to the Emperor 
as would imply that no night of his was ever unemployed. 
It is on the morrow of the Emperor's fall that this cycle 
of myths first makes its appearance, and to the best of 
my knowledge the first trace is to be found in a very rare 
book, now all but unprocurable, attributed to a certain 
Dufey, and entitled, Cotifessions de Napoleon. Shall I be 
frank ? Well, these Confessions are of so apocryphal a 
sort as to baffle criticism. It is not in the body of the 
work these fantastic statements anent paternity I speak of 
occur, but in a supplementary note added as an appendix 
at the end. The book appeared in 1816, and there is 
reason to suppose that it is to it the inventors of this 
spurious family of Napoleon's resorted for the subject- 
matter of their improbable fairy tales. This sourcej 
therefore, is of importance and worth noting, it seems to 

me, — the more so as it is generally unknown, even to 

264 



MME BONAPARTE 265 

experts on the subject. I publish in its entirety the text 
of this note, wherein error plays a large part, while pure 
imagination is by no means excluded. 

Note of the Natural Children of 
Napoleon Bonaparte 

More jealous to command than to please, Bonaparte 
was not gallant, and everywhere he had mistresses. He 
had a great name, a great power, immense treasures. He 
obtained from vanity and self-interest what any other man 
would fain have owed only to love. He had women 
of all classes of society, and in the days of his 
splendour he would often escape from his palace in a 
modest hackney-coach,^ and go to visit those easy 
beauties who are the shame of their own sex and the 
scourge of the other. Murat, before his crowning at 
Naples, used to accompany him in his nocturnal expedi- 
tions.2 He had several children, and never acknowledged 
one of them. He was never credited with a recognized 
mistress. It was less from sentiment than from physical 
appetite that he went after women. 

A woman settled at Bordeaux and sunk in the most 
obscure class of the population reared a son whom she 
openly declared she had had of him during the first 
campaign of Italy. She was known in her district of the 
town as Mme Bonaparte. 

^ Under the Empire, Canyette's carriage manufactory in the Rue des 
Martyrs suppHes for the Emperor's use "a carriage for incognito visits in 
town," at the price of 7000 francs. — Cf. Alph. Maze-Sensier, Les Fournis- 
seurs de Napoléon I. et des deux Impératrices. Paris, 1893, 8vo, p. m. 

2 "Sire," said Las-Cases to Napoleon, November 15, 1815, at St. 
Helena, " they will have it that at the height of your absolute power, you 
submitted to wear agreeable chains ; that you were on one occasion the hero 
of a romance ; that, meeting with a resistance that surprised you, you were in 
love with a lady of no rank ; that you actually wrote her a dozen letters ; that 
she subjugated you and constrained you to submit to a disguise and to go 
alone to see her, at night, at her own house in the middle of Paris. . . ." — 
Las-Cases, Memorial de Sainte- Hilè ne . . ., torn. i. p. 267. 



266 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

Again, we are assured that the little Queen gave him 
another son, of whom she was delivered after his return 
from Egypt, when he had sent for her after he was 
informed of Kléber's discourteous refusal.^ The birth of 
this child was anterior to the little Queen's second marriage 
with an officer whom she accompanied to a distant con- 
sulate.^ 

Again, mention is made of a beautiful Polish Countess 
who was mother by him of a girl.^ 

There has been much talk, in these latter days, of a 
young foreign lady who professed to be his daughter, and 
who, they say, lives in Paris.'^ 

His amours with a beautiful actress of the Théâtre- 
Français are public property.^ All France has heard of the 
strange scene she made him at Saint-Cloud, and which 
made his first consort witness of his infidelity.^ More than 
one other actress has been suspected of tender relations 

^ It is Mme Fourès who is here referred to ; her stor}' will be found in the 
Author's book Napoléon adultère, Paris, sans date [1910], iSmo, pp. 91 et 
suiv. — Napoleon had no child by her. " The little fool ! " he said of her to 
Bourrienne, " the little fool cannot make one!" To which Pauline Fourès 
retorted : "Faith ! 'tis no fault of mine ! " — Cf. Mémoires de AI. de Bour- 
rienne. Paris, MDCCCXXix, 8vo, tom. ii.p. 174. 

-This "officer," a droll figure of a man and a strange fellow, was one 
Henri de Ranchoup whom Pauline Fourès, after her divorce, married in 1800 
at Belleville. M. Frederic Masson has devoted a tasty page to him in his 
Napoléon et les Femmes . , ., p. 60. 

' By the Comtesse Walewska, a Pole, Napoleon had, as a matter of fact, 
not a daughter, but a son, Alexandre-Florian-Joseph-Colonna Walewski, 
born May 4, 18 10, at Walevvicc. 

^I have not succeeded in identifying the ''young foreign lady," and I 
may add I look upon this supposed daughter as a myth. 

° An allusion to Napoleon's intrigue with Mile George. — Cf. Mémoires 
inédits de Alademoiselle George. Paris, 1908, Svo. 

" "One day when Bonaparte had been working to excess on business 
which did not go as he wished and he was nervous and irritable, he wished to 
pass the night with Mile George, apparently with the object of calming his 
nerves. Nothing else would do. So he had her sent for to the Tuileries, and 
was closeted with her when, about two o'clock in the morning, the whole 
Palace was awakened by the frenzied ringing of the First Consul's bell. 
Everybody springs out of bed and hurries to the spot, to find Mile George in 



MLLE GEORGE 267 

with the Man of the Age} The respect due to the peace 
of households, be they what they may, silences us as to 
scandalous conjectures of the kind, 

The same scruples lead us not to push over far our 
conjectures concerning a child whose loss caused him so 
keen a grief, and one he could not conceal. This secret, if 
there is one, belongs to his own family and is connected 
with an event anterior to his first marriage.- All outraged 
husbands were not so indiscreet as Captain Revel, whose 
action is at the present mom.ent the subject of every 
conversation. 

In spite of the pains he took to publish in his memoir 
the birth certificate of a male infant by name Léon, the 
child of one Éléonore Denuelle, and of a father, then 
absent, one may well fail to be altogether convinced that 
the mother was really and truly Eléonore La Plaigne, his 
wife, and the infant called Léon the fruit of her liaison 
with Napoleon. Adhnc sub judice lis est. But an action at 
law is not a very trustworthy means of clearing up an 
affair of this sort. M. Revel, to whom it is very important 

terror trying to restore Bonaparte, who lies in a dead faint. A domestic thinks 
good to go and inform Joséphine. The latter hurriedly slips on a peignoir and 
rushes to the room, where we see her holding smelling-salts to her husband's 
nose, while Mile George in her night-shift raises his head and throws water 
on his temples. At last Bonaparte recovers his senses. Barely is he conscious 
of his surroundings ere he falls into a terrific rage at seeing his wife in the 
room ; he scolds the unhappy George for rousing all the Palace for a trifle, 
and so great is his fury that he is on the point of another seizure. Joséphine 
withdraws ; Mile George vanishes in her turn, quite upset, as may be supposed ; 
Napoleon never forgave her for her lack of self-possession." — Joseph Tuiquan, 
Napoleon Amoureux. Paris, sans date, i8mo, pp. 113, 114. 

^ Among actresses who, without improbability, may be conjectured to have 
lieen Napoleon's mistresses, may be mentioned, besides Mile George : 
Grassini, Mme Branchu, Mile Leveni, Mile Duchesnois, Mile George's 
rival at the Comédie-Française, Thérèse Bourgoin, and others also, perhaps ; 
each has a word or two devoted to her story in Frédéric Masson, Napoléon et 
les Femmes ... ; pp. 93 et suiv. 

^ The author is here hinting at the rumours current at the time regarding 
the incestuous relations between Hortense and Napoleon. This invention of 
the pamphleteers of the Consulate has been long ago and very eloquently 
refuted. There is no need to say more about it. 



268 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

to dissipate all doubts on the subject, declares that Léon 
has been created a Count. So much the better for the 
boy, if the title has a good income attached to it. The 
little nobleman would not be left without consolation. 
M. Revel appears in no wise disposed to give him a share 
in such as he expects from the hundred thousand francs 
he claims as damages and compensation, which we hope 
he may get. He will not do for little Léon what the 
Count Almaviva did for his son. The stage has tried its 
best to inculcate on outraged husbands an heroic com- 
plaisance. But in spite of the noble maxims that adorn 
every scene of the Mère coupable and the Misayithropie et 
Repentir, husbands will continue to be what they always 
have been. 

We repeat a tale, without venturing to guarantee its 
accuracy, how on his journey after the return from Elba, 
Napoleon actually received a visit from the faithless wife 
who gave M. Revel cause for complaint, and who is to-day 
the Comtesse de ^ 

It would seem that the birth and fate of Bonaparte's 
natural children will ever remain wrapped in the deepest 
mystery. Let us hope, however, that in this noble land 
of France where so many good folks are greedy after 
scandal, the veil whereof we have neither been able nor 
deemed it right to lift a corner, will one day be entirely 
raised, — if for no other reason than because the unhappy 
objects of such revelations are without the right, as they 
are without the hope, of reaping any advantage from 
them. The light will be disastrous and will only 
illuminate an abyss of remorse, wretchedness, and sorrow. 

The foregoing note makes pretensions to be historical — 
pretensions which we are perfectly willing to let it enjoy. 

^ I have nowhere found trace or confirmation of this meeting of Napoleon 
and Éléonore in 1815. But all we know of the Emperor's stopping-places on 
his return from Elba to Paris makes it pretty certain the rumour is mere 
fancy. 



THE FAIR PROVENÇALE 269 

On the same subject there also exists a Romance, copious 
and full of matter, that puts forward the same claim. It 
is entitled Le Colonel Dm>ar,fils natural du Napoléon, after 
the Memoirs of a Contemporary, and was published at 
Paris in 1827 in 4 vols. 8vo. This historical treasure even 
crossed the Rhine and earned the following year the 
honours of translation {Duvar der Kaiscj-liche Bastard, 
aus de7i Meinoiren des Obersts Duvar, naturlichen Sohnes 
des Kaisers Napoleon, from the French. Stuttgart, 1828, 
3 vols. i2mo). This amazing production deserves analysis. 
In it the author, under the pseudonym of OTalonne, an 
anagram on the real name which led readers to suppose 
him an Irishman " because of his curious name," makes 
Bonaparte the lover of the Fair Provençale, wife of one 
Duvar whose rôle and situation are left in a certain 
vagueness in this fantastic fairy-tale. Of course the 
intrigue ends in the arrival of a child, at whose birth 
officiâtes Dubois, the celebrated Dubois of Marie Louise's 
confinement. The child, named Léon, just like the 
Countess Eleonore's son, was placed, under O'Palonne's 
auspices, at the Collège Impérial, while the mother — 
which would seem to indicate that the shadowy Duvar had 
returned to the bosom of his unknown fathers — was 
married again to the Préfet of the Indre-et-Loire ! 
Which Préfet ? This Department, under the Empire, had 
three Préfets — General of Division Pommereul, in 1804; 
Baron Lambert, in 1807; Comte de Kergariou, in 1812. 
Which to choose among so many ? There is one detail 
may put us on the track ; this Préfet's mother was " a quite 
charming little lady," who was reputed to have been brought 
up at the Parc-aux-Cerfs. I express no opinion. For 
the son, he went to the Collège Impérial at Saint-Cyr, 
where, after a review held by the Emperor (" who," he is 
represented as saying, " would have given a great deal if 
the majesty of his rank had allowed him to embrace me, 
to press me a moment to his heart,"), he was appointed 



270 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

Lieutenant and posted to the 23rd Regiment of Infantry, 
then in Dalmatia. After a number of heroic and 
sentimental adventures, Léon reached his destination, 
Ragusa. The Colonel of his Regiment sent him to reside 
at the house of a Comtesse Sorgoï, whom I suspect to have 
been a Muscovite, or worse, and who, albeit of a certain 
age, was very well preserved and possessed remains of 
beauty. To calm her nightly terrors, this lady on the 
shady side of life thought well to put the inflammable 
Duvar to sleep in a room next door to her own. This 
proximity invited him to the boldest and most gallant 
enterprises towards his hostess and her waiting-maids. 

Ils ne mouraient pas tous, mais tous étaient frappés.^ 

Under these agreeable circumstances our friend Duvar 
compromised himself in a series of madcap doings, with 
which even the diverting escapades of the late Due de 
Roquelaure cannot compare. As the result of one of 
these adventures, the most daring of all, he was banished 
to one of the mountain garrisons. There a Sultana, 
escaped from a neighbouring seraglio, joined him. But 
love was succeeded by promotion, A dispatch recalls 
Duvar to Paris in the office of Aide-de-Camp to Marshal 
Ney. He flies to take up his post. Wonder of wonders ! 
He is given the Legion of Honour. Why? We can only 
ask. Now he is sent off to Russia, He is made Officer 
of the Legion of Honour. How is this? Another mys- 
tery. Then another step : he wins his majority. Gallant 
Duvar ! But he is taken prisoner on the retreat from 
Moscow. A passing shadow. The Emperor has his eye 
on him, and has him exchanged against a superior officer 
in the Prussian service. Back in France, he learns that 
his mother, the Préfet's lady, is dead. From 1813 to 181 5 
he is dumb. I do not know what he was doing. All I 
can say is that he has been created Baron. During the 

* " They did not all die, but all were hit." 



THE GALLANT DUVAR 271 

Hundred Days he is made Colonel, and the Emperor 
calls him " my dear Duvar 1 " 

V amitié d'un grand homme est un bienfait des dieux, '^ 

— as is well proved by Duvar, a Colonel at twenty ! At 
twenty ; yes, I mean what I say, at twenty ! Like a hero 
he fights at Waterloo, and is wounded ; he is carried to 
Avesnes, where a twofold balm awaits his wounds — first, 
a letter from Napoleon advising him to " get well, and 
live and serve France ; expect everything of time " ; 
secondly, a pocket-book stuffed with 99,000 francs in 
bank notes. I cannot tell why this letter has escaped 
the editors of Napoleon l.'s correspondence under the 
Second Empire. But, with Duvar, why wonder at any- 
thing? Of course, as an ardent Bonapartist he has cruel 
misadventures under the Restoration. He is sent, to be 
under surveillance, to join the 9th Military Division at 
Montpellier. After two years of this, consumed with 
ennui, he decamps, makes for Havre, and slips secretly on 
board a vessel bound for St. Helena. Disguised as a 
foremast hand, he reaches Longwood just in time to be 
taken on as a kitchen help, an under-cook having fallen 
ill. But Hudson Lowe, that hawk-eyed jailer, scents out 
the intruder, and discovers the plot. The virtuous Duvar 
is seized, thrown aboard an American brig, and, deplor- 
able victim of filial affection, landed at Rochefort, whence 
he is dispatched to Besançon, again under surveillance. 
Then a second flight. He sails for America, and, reaching 
Baltimore, condemns himself to live in melancholy in- 
activity — a mode of existence far from agreeable to the 
erstwhile Colonel of twenty. On August i, 1821, he 
hears the news of the Emperor's death. Instantly he 
hastens to the seashore, leaves on a rock his coat and a 
pocket-book with the entry " I go to rejoin him ! " and 
plunges into the waves. Now, I see nothing unnatural in 

^ " The friendship of a great man is a boon from the gods." 



272 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

the fact that a soft-hearted generation has seen fit to shed 
gentle tears over the unhappy fate of this madcap adven- 
turer. 

Nor is this precocious Colonel the end of the series of 
Imperial bastards. Legend adds another — a negro this 
time. Yes, a negro, nothing more nor less. The mys- 
terious story is to be read in Charles Monselet's 
U Événement : — 

" Léon Gozlan in his younger days knew a black 
Napoleon, whose history he has narrated at length — a 
tragic tale if ever there was one. If this black Napoleon 
were alive now, he would inscribe himself no doubt as 
another on the list of all the aspirants to that name. 
But, alas! he got himself guillotined at Aix about 1824, 
Napoleon though he was. He was then twenty-six years 
of age, and had come from Egypt to Marseilles. * The 
great man ' had engendered him, during his amazing 
Egyptian expedition, beneath the shade of some granite 
sphinx. He was not exactly black, but a mulatto, copper- 
coloured, and endowed with a prodigious likeness to papa. 
He had two uncles in business at Marseilles, who had 
given him an excellent education. Add to this repeated 
travels in Nubia, Ethiopia, beyond Jordan, an intimate 
acquaintance with the Greek and Arabic languages, a 
burning, all-devouring imagination. The consciousness 
of his high birth had inspired in Napoléon Tard ... an 
inordinate pride. In his confidential talks with Léon 
Gozlan under the plane-trees of the Cours Belsunce or on 
the quay of the Old Harbour his dream was of nothing 
less than to refound an Empire of the East. ' The East 
is mine,' he would say in tones of fervent conviction, * as 
the West was Napoleon's, my father's. ... I will pro- 
claim my blood, my name, my projects ; I will put myself 
at the head, not of the Turks, but of the Arabs ; the 
Turks are played out. With the Arabs I will restore the 
civilization of the Ptolemies. 1 speak their language ; I 



A BLACK NAPOLEON 273 

am of their race, of their flesh and blood ; they will hear 
me; I will call each town, each village, every man and 
every child by name. All will come to me.' And it was 
to be the complete transformation of Egypt. ' I will do 
for Egypt what my father had not the generosity to do. 
He destined it to be a great highway to pass along to 
India, instead of making it independent. With me, and 
through me, it shall be free ; no more Beys, nor Pachas, 
nor slaves ; freedom as in the days of the Caliphs ! And 
then we will reopen the holy libraries ; we summon to our 
cities the learning that is enslaved in Europe ; the Greek 
of Plato, the Latin of Tacitus, are current in the streets of 
Alexandria; light comes once more from the East, and 
the prophecies are accomplished ! " Gozlan, whom every 
paradox allured, took a singular delight in listening to 
this strange young man. Unfortunately their friendship 
was suddenly interrupted. Napoléon Tard . . . had de- 
manded of his two uncles a very considerable sum of 
money, intended to help him in the realization of his 
schemes. The uncles refused with one accord. The 
" black Napoleon " was bitterly exasperated. We will 
leave Gozlan to tell the sequel : — 

" I was walking with him on the quays at Marseilles 
when of a sudden he began to play with a knife two 
or three inches long; then he begged me to wait for 
him. He returned presently, to tell me coolly : ' I have 
just packed off my uncles to America. ... In your 
language, I have just killed my two uncles.'" 

It was quite true. Well, the young Egyptian's 
ways of doing things were deemed a great deal too 
hasty, and in due course he appeared before the Court 
of Assize at Aix. In vain was it pleaded that he 
was mad, — which he undoubtedly was, — as mad as a 
hatter! — but no attempt was made by his counsel to 
make capital of his illustrious birth ; this would have 
18 



274 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

been a poor recommendation, the Napoleonic party 
having no longer any existence outside Beranger's 
songs. In any case, no matter what efforts might have 
been made to save him, Napoléon Tard . . . would have 
defeated them all by the effrontery of his demeanour 
and the silent scorn he displayed. He was sentenced 
to death unhesitatingly. He was led to the scaffold 
one fine sunny day in the market-place of Aix. His 
proud look was not abashed. Of the two uncles he 
stabbed, one survived his wound." 

M. Charles Nauroy, who relates the story, adds this 
supplementary notice, which is not without interest : — 

" Monselet found the account of the ' black Napoleon ' 
in Paris ou le Livre des Cefit et un, 1832, viii. p. 91. 
Contrary to his custom, Gozlan has invented nothing ; 
according to the Monitetcr of October 14 and 20, 1824, 
the ' black Napoleon ' was named Alexis Tardieu and 
was twenty-four at the time of his death. His uncle 
who died of his wound was called Tardieu, and the 
second victim, the other's father - in - law, was called 
Rouchon. 

This negro son is the first of Napoleon's illegitimate 
offspring. Léon is the second, as being born in 1806, the 
third is Walewski, who saw the light in 18 10; now we 
come to the fourth, whose existence was revealed by 
Amédée Pigeon, in V Allemagne de M. de Bismarck, in 
1884:— 

"7 March 1883. 

" At Lindenthal, near Cologne, has lately died an old 
unmarried woman so poor that the Commune has had to 
meet the expenses of her burial. She was known as Mile 
Falkenberg. She lived in one wretched room. Some 
months ago she fell ill, and feeling herself in danger of 
speedy death, told the sick-nurse who was attending her 
to open a chest of drawers and give her a packet of 



MLLE FALKENBERG 275 

letters which she burned there and then. When delirious, 
she declared she was Napoleon's daughter. 

"A Mulheim paper, the Miilheimer Volkszeitung, 
states that it knov/s from a sure source that in 181 1 
a female child was born in the Archbishop's Palace at 
Cologne ; that this child's mother was a young lady of noble 
birth, unmarried, who would seem to have had relations 
with Napoleon. The child had as godfather King William 
III., and received the name of Countess of Falkenberg. 
She was brought up at Montjoie at Napoleon's charge, 
then removed to Italy to a convent, which she only 
quitted at the age of thirty. By too great love of 
luxury, say some, by too much generosity in alms- 
giving, say others, she spent all her patrimony, which 
was not inconsiderable. The Countess returned, a 
ruined woman, to Cologne, at the age of fifty. A 
notary, an inhabitant of that city, sent a petition to 
Napoleon III., craving assistance on her behalf, but 
the petition remained unanswered. The Countess was 
obliged to work for a living and became plain Mile 
Falkenberg, seamstress. She lived wretchedly. This 
is the woman who died last week. The Tagblatt, of 
Berlin, professes to know that the deceased received an 
allowance of 30 marks a month which was paid her 
by a wealthy family living on the banks of the Rhine. 
This family is descended, illegitimately, from Jérôme- 
Napoléon, King of Westphalia." 

It is in Egypt the epic begins ; it closes at St. Helena. 
The former sees a Negro Napoleon, the latter an Ameri- 
can. Here is the story : — 

" Jérômists and Victorians may both be reassured ; 
this alleged son of Napoleon l., born at St. Helena, will 
be no stumbling-block to either of them, for he is just 
dead and is now interred in the Cemetery of Lone 
Mount:ain at San Francisco. This is how the World 
of that city gives his history: — 



276 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

" ' The serving-maid in Napoleon's prison, or rather the 
housekeeper appointed by the EngHsh Government to the 
exiled Monarch's establishment, was a woman of middle 
age, still very attractive, and possessing the finest head of 
hair that can be imagined. Napoleon, like Jupiter in 
Dryden's celebrated poem, graved his image on the heart 
of this ' fair Olympia ' who had wandered to the solitudes 
of St. Helena, and had by her a child so strikingly like its 
father that the sight of it might well have made his 
legitimate descendants blush. After the Emperor's death, 
the housekeeper left St. Helena with her boy and returned 
to London, where she married a watchmaker of the name 
of Gordon. The latter, when he married the mother, 
adopted the son, gave him his own name, and taught him 
his trade. On growing up, the young Gordon-Bonaparte 
went and settled at New London (Connecticut), where he 
quickly acquired a fair competence, and later on a fair 
amount of political influence. He even wrote sometimes 
for the newspapers in his leisure moments — contributing 
more particularly a number of articles to the Bulletin of 
Norwich and the Star of New London. In these later 
days he had retired to San Francisco, where he has just 
died. Gordon-Bonaparte inherited from his father a keen 
intelligence, which served him well in business matters ; 
but he was of a taciturn and extremely reserved tempera- 
ment, and his relations, outside business, hardly extended 
beyond a very narrow circle consisting of a few privileged 
friends. He was the living image of his natural father ; 
and persons who did not know the secret of his birth, on 
seeing him for the first time, were struck by his extraordi- 
nary likeness to Napoleon I. However, Gordon never 
spoke of his illustrious origin save when under the influence 
of drink ; but at such times he would allow no man, in his 
presence, to throw doubt on his being the son of the 
" Corsican conqueror." ' " 

A melancholy revelation this ! This Emperor's son 



A BONAPARTE IN BANKRUPTCY 277 

drank " like a fish." Has he left descendants ? I do not 
know; and I imagine it is to another, a fresh claimant, 
that the following notice refers, a cutting from th^ Journal 
of August 22, 191 3, and based on a telegram from 
London : — 



"A Bonaparte in Bankruptcy 
" Same dark hair, same falling lock, same profile as the 
other, ' the Great,' Juan Bonaparte, an actor, appeared 
this afternoon before the Wandsworth Bankruptcy Court. 
An insufficient salary in a historical play, in which he 
takes the part of the great Napoleon, has brought him to 
this pass. A petty failure, at the best, for the debts only 
total 3500 francs, and the assets balance them within 25 
napoleons or so. 'It is therefore out of sheer revenge,' 
declares the comedian, ' that a set of unreasonable creditors 
have endeavoured to humiliate the representative of an 
illustrious family.' Juan Bonaparte, in fact, informed the 
Judge in Bankruptcy in so many words that he was a 
direct descendant of the immortal conqueror, being the son 
of John Bernard Bonaparte, known as Sheuer, grandson of 
Napoleon Bonaparte." 

Needless to say, this illustrious parentage leaves me 
sceptical. I have the same feeling with regard to another 
piece of information, originally emanating from Doctor 
Fortuné Mazel : — 

" When I was at Toulouse, in charge of the lazaretto of 
Lalande, at the time of the cholera epidemic of 18S5, I had 
the honour of receiving a visit from Cardinal Desprez, 
Archbishop of Toulouse, the only official personage who 
had the courage at that time to cross the perilous threshold. 
The lazaretto was, indeed, installed on the premises of the 
Great Seminary, which had been put at the disposal of the 
Hospital administration for that purpose by the Cardinal. 
Now, I have a vivid recollection of having been told by a 



278 AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

number of people that this Cardinal Desprez, born in 1807 
at Ostricourt (Nord), was the natural son of Napoleon I. 
I cannot say that his features recalled those of the great 
Emperor. He was at the time yS, a tall, rather bent, thin 
old man, of a severe aspect, with an angular countenance 
and a prominent nose. It was pretty generally agreed 
that he had not inherited the great intellectual gifts of his 
supposed father." 

So we see there are claimants of all sorts and kinds ! 
M. Charles Nauroy has unearthed yet another : in the 
official report of the Chamber of Deputies for February 25, 
1837, reproduced also in the Moniteur of the 26th, we 
read : — 

" A M. Bonaparte (Frederic), describing himself as a 
natural son of the Emperor Napoleon, at Paris, petitioned 
to be heard on certain pretensions which he would seem 
to have publicly advanced in France and abroad. The 
Commission judged this proposal and the contents of 
the remainder of the petition undeserving the attention of 
the Chamber, and instructed me to move the order of the 
day (Adopted)." 

Besides the different texts, sometimes of a very unex- 
pected nature, exhumed by M. Nauroy, there are others 
again with which he concludes his investigation on the 
Emperor's natural sons. I quote one : — 

" Finally, we read in Victor Hugo, Choses vues, 1887, 
8vo, p. 32: ' M. Duchâtel, Minister of the Interior, — who 
is generally reputed a son of the Emperor's, be it said by 
the way . . .' I can only express my strong doubts 
regarding this statement of Victor Hugo's, who has made 
so many mistakes. Again, p. 63 : ' The Queen's Chaplain, 
who assisted the Curé of Neuilly in the administration of 
Extreme Unction (to the Duke of Orleans, in 1842), is a 
natural son of Napoleon, the Abbe *" * *, who is very like 
the Emperor, less the look of genius.' Now the only 



BOUZIGUE NAPOLÉON 279 

priest attached to the Queen's household at that date was 
the Abbé Guillen, Bishop of Morocco {Almanack natio7ial 
pour 184.2, p. 46). And he was born in 1768, before 
Napoleon i." 

Does the reader desire more yet? "Among the 
spurious, — supposititious, — children of the Emperor are 
cited Mile de Lespinasse and Gérard de Nerval, who made 
no secret of being the son of Napoleon I." He was not the 
only one ! As a matter of course, in this matter of 
illegitimate offspring of the Emperor, the Intermédiaire 
des chercheurs et curieux has instituted a long investiga- 
tion, which, be it said, has led to no very important 
discovery. Far from it ! Of the notes it has published 
on the subject I quote the two or three below, which seem 
to me the most curious, I do not say the most likely to be 
true, the most picturesque, I do not say the most authentic. 
The first emanates from a M. Deprolfort : — 

"About i860, a lady, an owner of ironworks in the 
Jura, was reputed to be a daughter of Napoleon I. She 
had a large fortune, and enjoyed great influence. It was 
she, the story went, who, at the time the Pontarlier railway 
was building, was responsible for the decision to divert 
the line from Mouchard by way of Arbois and Andelot 
instead of letting it follow the direct route. In 1878 and 
1880 I repeatedly met her son at the house of one of my 
friends, a native of Franche-Comté. He was then living 
in Paris. He bore a likeness to Napoleon I. 

" Between 1869 and 1874, and even later, the residents 
of Constantinople knew a Baron X., who passed in that 
city for a natural son of Napoleon I., to whom he bore a 
striking resemblance." 

Here we have pretenders of high degree. Now we come 
to one of a much shabbier cast : — 

" There lived at Tarbes some years ago a mendicant 
who showed the Napoleonic type, so much so that every- 



2 8o AN UNKNOWN SON OF NAPOLEON 

body fell into the way of never calling him anything but 
Napoleon or Bonaparte, though his real name was Bouzigue. 
The street urchins used to run after him, shouting, 'Halloa, 
Napoleon, when are you going to Paris for your white 
horse ? ' Bouzigue has nephews still living who are 
known only under the name of Bonaparte or Napoleon. 
As for him, if he was asked his history, he would reply 
that Napoleon, coming once to Tarbes, — I know nothing 
of any such visit, but I doubt if it ever occurred, — he 
would reply, I say, that Napoleon, on a visit to Tarbes, 
had slept the night at an hotel in the Marcadeau, where 
he had found a superb servant-maid to whom he had 
offered five Napoleons for her night, and the result was 
his (Bouzigue's) birth. The only interesting point in the 
ruffianly story is the light it throws on the man Bouzigue's 
state of mind ; bearing a resemblance to Napoleon, he 
gets called by his name, comes to believe that he is his 
son, and presently invents a tale which he tells with 
such assurance that he ends by convincing himself he 
is speaking the truth." 

Among so many, is it to be wondered at if confusion 
arises between one and another? This is what has 
happened to Henry d'Ideville, who, in his Journal (Tun 
diplomate, Paris, 1875, i8mo, p. 56, quoted by the Inter- 
médiaire, has mistaken Léon for Walewski, and has made 
out of the two an individual who very certainly does not 
resemble either the one or the other. Those who have 
read Leon's story can easily see this from what follows : — 

"Dresden, 15 March 1868. 
"... The Prince (Jerome - Napoléon) reminded me 
strongly of another man whom I had met in my younger 
days, and who was the authentic son of the Emperor 

Napoléon I., the Comte X . This pitiful personage, 

devoid of manliness or morality, was living a strange life 
in the Quartier latin in 1850, at the time I was taking my 
course in Law. Shorter than Prince Napoléon, he was 



COMTESSE WALEWSKA 281 

a startlingly lifelike portrait of his father, but he, too, 
differed from the Emperor in expression ; his was hideous, 
and reflected all the evil instincts of the man. If, by any 
chance, he had been a man of worth, what part would he 

have played? The Comte X was the son of that 

mysterious Polish noblewoman who presented herself at 
Fontainebleau on March 19, 1814, and whom the Emperor 
refused to see.^ Why ? 

Amid all these improbabilities and contradictions, 
there now comes a touch of the grotesque. It is an 
extract from a printseller's catalogue — the advertisement 
of a broadsheet or illustrated " ballad " representing the 
murder " committed by one Casirola on his mistress at the 
moment she had just carried to the grave her child which 
had died the day before." And the catalogue adds : — 

" The sheet in question contains other interesting 
matter. There are particulars of a certain Pierre Pignol, 
who professed to be a natural son of the Emperor 
Napoleon." 

I will stop here. The above quotations, one and all, 
enable us to judge of the likelihood, as they do of the 
persistent character of this myth of Imperial bastards. 
There is not a word of truth in them ; it is all lies together. 
No matter; the marvellous tale must be spiced with 
mysteries and secrets to please the popular palate. Well, 
let the public invent them, and cherish them, and feed on 
them ! But let it imagine what it will, can its wildest 
fancies match the sordid and splendid romance that 
comes to us from old forgotten papers like an echo of that 
Empire that lives eternally in the memory of mankind ? 

^ The Emperor did not refuse to receive Mme Walewska. At Fon- 
tainebleau, in the last days, when the Emperor, forsaken by all, had been 
seeking to find in death a refuge that Fate denied him, she arrives, and 
all night long, in an ante-chamber, waits for him to send for her. He, 
absorbed in his reflexions, exhausted by the physical crisis he had just gone 
through, does not think of summoning her till an hour after she has gone. 
" Poor woman ! he said, " she will think I have forgotten her ! " — Frédéric 
Masson, Napoléon el les Femmes . . ., p. 223. 



INDEX 



ACHARD, Charlotte, i6, 

Amélie, Queen, 233. 

Amerang, 237, 238. 

Amiens, 232. 

Andral, Dr. Guillaume, 73. 

Anspach, Margravine of, 160. 

Arras, 232. 

Artois, Comte d', 124. 

— Comtesse d', 26. 

Augier de la Sauzaie, Philippe, 
118, 119, I3I-I35) 205, 206. 

Aumont-Thiéville, Maître, 216. 

Austerlitz, 64. 

Auxonne, 65. 

Aymé, J. R. M., Military Treasurer 
of the Legion of Honour, 'j'})- 

Bacciochi, Mme, 67. 

Baring Brothers, Bankers, 194, 

195. 
Barrés, Maurice, 246. 
Bassano, Due de, 195. 
Bates, Joshua, 194. 
Beauharnais, Hortense de. See 

Hortense, Queen of Holland. 

— Stéphanie de, 37. 

— Vicomtesse de, 27. 
Beauvais, 232. 
Bellemois, M., 187, 188. 
Benoist, Colonel of the National 

Guard, 172-175. 
Bergeon, Maître, 230, 
Berlin, 202, 203. 
Bernard, Jean, 219-222. 
Berthier, Alexandre, 106. 



Bertrand, Arthur, 200, 201. 
Besançon, 101-104. 
Beyrout, 238. 
Boghari, 247. 
Bonafous, Colonel, 135. 
Bonaparte, Charlotte, 27. 

— Jérôme, King of Westphalia, 

120, 181, 189, 195, 197. 

— Joseph, King of Spain, 81, 157, 

175, 181-185, 189, 195, 197. 

— Louis, King of Holland, 185. 

— Mme, mother of the Emperor, 

181, 182. 

— Prince Eugène, 183. 

— Prince Lucien, 185. 

— Prince Roland, 247. 
Bordeaux, 265. 

Borghèse, Princess Pauline, 28, 

29. 
Bossio, M., 200. 
Boucheseiche, M., 96-98, 124. 
Boulogne, 188, 200, 201. 
Bourg-la-Reine, 99. 
Bourgoin, Thérèse, 267. 
Bourienne, L. A. F. de, 81. 
Boyé, M., Mayor of Saint-Denis, 

172-175. 
Branchu, Mme, 267. 
Bron, General, 106. 
Bronie, 74. 
Bry-sur-Marne, 247. 
Buelle, Mme, 179, 180. 

Cacault, General, 118, 133. 
Caillieux, M., 214. 



284 



INDEX 



Campan, Mme, 26-30, 35-37, 40, 

41, 46, 49, 50, 53. 6r, 125, 

126. 
Canclaux, General, 20, 53, 55. 
Canizzaro, Duchesse de, 191. 
Carnot, L. N. M., 123. 
Caroline, Queen, Consort of 

George iv., 159. 
Cartier, M,, 232. 
Cassel, 120. 
Chalon-sur-Saône, 67. 
Chantilly, 50, 58. 
Charbonnel, Baptiste, 2i<2, 215, 

230. 
Charles x., 115. 

Charlotte, Princess of Wales, 159, 
Charrier, M., 165. 
Chartres, 123. 
Cîteaux, 65. 
Clamecy, 129. 
Clarcke, M., 100, 104, 105, 107, 

III. 
Clichy, 164-168, 177, 178. 
Coëssin, Guillaume, 168-170, 181, 

182, 192, 197, 199. 230, 231. 
Constant, body - servant of 

Napoleon, 66, 71, 78, 81, 95. 
Contzen, Alexandre, 182. 
Coubertin, 27. 
Crailsheim, Baron von, 237. 

— Clementina von, 237. 

— Maria von, 237. 
Crauford, Sir James, 161. 
Crémieux, M., 209. 

D'Alton-Shee, 160. 
Darnault, M., 217. 
Daublaine, M., 205. 
Davrange d'Haugeranville, 

General, 21, 34. 
Debry, Jean, 102, 103. 
Decourdemanche, M., 217. 
Déjazet, Mlle, 200, 201. 



Delorme, M., 207. 

Delpech, Louis, 165-167, 178- 

181. 
Deniau, M., 217. 
Denon, Baron, 139, 141, 255, 256, 

258, 262. 
Denuelle, Dominique, 25, 29-34, 

36-38, 45, ICI, 102, 104, 137. 

— Mme Éléonore, 25, 29-38, 43, 

ICI, 102, 104, 165. 

— Mlle Éléonore, at the theatre 

with her parents, 23 ; intro- 
duced to François Revel, 24 ; 
her birth, her portrait by 
Ledoux, 25 ; at home for hoh- 
days from Mme Campan's 
boarding - school, 26 ; her 
school - fellows, 27 - 29 ; 
François Revel proposes to 
her, 31 ; he is accepted, and 
she returns to school, 32 ; 
the marriage, yj^ 38 ; drawing 
her husband's portrait, 39 ; 
her constant visits to Mme 
Campan's, 40 ; cause sus- 
picion, 41 ; she shared the 
Emperor's bed, 43 ; placed 
in an educational establish- 
ment at Chantilly, 50 ; taken 
into the householdlof Princess 
Caroline Murat and becomes 
Napoleon's mistress, 56 ; she 
sues for a divorce from Revel, 
59 ; and succeeds, 60 ; her 
liaison with Murat, 63 ; 
Revel's account of her meet- 
ing with Napoleon, 64 ; the 
house in which she lived, 68- 
70 ; by her third marriage 
became Comtesse de Lux- 
bourg, was known as Mme 
de Saint-Laurent, 71 ; alters 
the clock that she may leave 



INDEX 



285 



Napoleon earlier, her letters 
to him, 72 ; her son Léon 
born, Ti ; forbidden to 
present herself to Napoleon 
without permission, 78 ; her 
dowry, 86 ; Revel's account 
of her profligacy, 116; her 
marriage to Augier de la 
Sauzaie, 118; her third 
marriage, 119; entices Léon 
to Mannheim, 149, 150; 
living in Paris again, her 
husband being the Bavarian 
Minister, 202 ; their musical 
entertainments. Count Leon's 
attentions to her, 203, 204 ; a 
rupture over money matters, 
204 ; lawsuits between them, 
205-207 ; resulting in the 
Comte de Luxbourg's recall, 
207 ; is told by Moquard 
that the Emperor will not 
receive Léon, 227 ; her death, 
236, 239-241. 

Denuelle,MlleZulma, 24, 239,241. 

Dourdan, 57, 61, 92, 128. 

Dresden, 202. 

Dubois, M., 163. 

Duchesnois, Mile, 267. 

Duhamel, Herr, 113. 

Dupont, Comte, 113-115, 141. 

Ebrington, Lord, 78. 
Ecouen, 125, 126. 
Elba, 78, 113. 
Elegert, Baronne d', 246. 
Esterno, Comte d', 160. 
Etampes, 98. 
Evreux, 45. 

Fade, M., 163. 

Fain, Baron, 71, 79, 156, 209. 

Farquhar, Dowager Duchess, 19t. ' 



Faudoas, Félicité de, 28, 29. 

Feltre, Due de, 128. 

Fesch, Cardinal, 162, 167, 181, 

183, 233. 
Flandrin, Mme, 69. 
Florence, 159. 
Fontainebleau, 78, 79. 
Forest, Sophie, 22. 
Fourcs, Mme, 266. 
Fournal, M., 152, 156. 
Fournier, General, 160, 214. 
Fouché, Joseph, 106. 

Garcia, Manuel, 203. 

Gauthier, General, 19. 

Geneva, 112, 124. 

Geoffroy, M., 85. 

George, Mlle, 66, 266, 267, 

Gillet, M., 252-263. 

Girtanner, M., 120. 

Goubie, M., 68, 69. 

Gourgaud, General, 160, 161, 

208-215, 231. 
Grassini, Mile, 66, 267. 
Guenin, Quartermaster-Sergeant, 

61. 
Guiche, Due de, 161. 
Guizot, M., 191. 

Hamburg, 112, 113, 128. 
Hennenhofer, Major, 154. 
Henry, Jean-Claude, 70, 119, 204. 
Hervas, Nièves, 28. 
Hesse, Captain, 158-161, 192, 

208. 
Hortense, Queen of Holland, 27, 

28, 88, 125, 126, 185, 190, 267. 
Howard, Miss, mistress of 

Napoleon in., 70. 
Hulot, Eugénie, 28. 

Jardine, Mr., Bow Street Magis- 
trate, 193. 



286 



INDEX 



Jonet, Mlle. See Léon, Mme. 

— Maximilian, 235. 
Josephine, Empress, 65, 69, 75, 

125, 267. 
Joy, Messrs, 198. 

Kien, Martial, 182, 192, 194. 
Konigfels, Herr, 113. 
Kurakine, Prince, 78, 117. 

La Feuille, Quartermaster, 42, 

45, 46, 52, 56. 
La Rochelle, 246. 
Larrey, M., 160. 
Las Cases, 88, 90, 139, 141, 255, 

256, 258, 262, 265. 
Lavalette, Comte de, 139, 255, 

256, 258, 262. 

— Felix de, 160. 

Lebon, Maître, 46-48, 58, 92, 93, 

100, 125. 
Leclerc, Aimée, 28. 
Léon, Charles, son of Comte 

Léon, 235, 245, 246. 

— Charlotte, daughter of Comte 

Léon, 246, 247. 

— Comte, mistaken as to the 

house in which he was born, 
69 ; his birth, 73 ; taken 
from his mother and entrusted 
to nurses, brought up under 
the name of Macon, 79 ; 
Napoleon appoints a guardian 
for him, 81-85 5 his schools, 
85, 86 ; his income from 
Napoleon, 86 ; their last 
meeting at Malmaison, 87 ; 
Napoleon's legacy to him, 
88, 89 ; Revel's cases against 
him for disavowal of paternity, 
137-142 ; his income, 147 ; 
his costly tastes, his establish- 
ment, 148, 149 ; his desire to 



be with his mother, 149 ; he 
leaves his tutor at the theatre 
and slips off to Mannheim, 
150; nothing known of his 
life there, 152; he had 
thoughts of taking service in 
the army of the Grand Duke 
of Baden, 153; the Aide-de- 
Camp of the Grand Duke 
makes inquiries as to his 
status and fortune, 154; 
which his guardian supplies, 
154, 155 ; he returns to Paris, 
155 ; the Family Council 
gives him his freedom, 156 ; 
his resemblance to the 
Emperor, 156-158; his 
gambling habits, his affair 
with Captain Hesse, 158-160; 
is tried for manslaughter and 
acquitted, 160, 161 ; hunted 
down by Baron Rosenberg, 

161 ; a brilliant horseman, 

162 ; and a deal in horses, 
162, 163 ; in a debtors' prison, 
164-167 ; embraces mysti- 
cism,. 168-170; his position 
with regard to the Imperial 
family, 171-198 ; he joins the 
National Guard, becomes 
Major, 172 ; falls out with 
the Colonel, 173-175 ; goes 
to England and sees Joseph 
Bonaparte, 175, 176 ; relieved 
of his duties in the National 
Guard, 176; the sordid life 
he was living after his release 
from Clichy, 177-181 ; he 
goes again to England to see 
his uncles Joseph and Jerome, 
181-185; is accused of being 
a police spy, 185, 186 ; and 
of coming to England to chal- 



INDEX 



287 



lenge Louis Napoleon, 187- 
188 ; his insulting letters to 
him, 189-191 ; sends Lieuten- 
ant-Colonel Ratcliffe with the 
challenge, 191 ; they meet at 
Wimbledon, 192 ; the police 
arrive and they are brought 
up at Bow Street, 193 ; and 
bound over, 194 ; returns 
from his English trip, 199 ; 
selling house property, 200, 
201 ; cultivates his mother, 
who is now in Paris, 202- 
204 ; money matters cause a 
rupture, 204 ; and lead to law- 
suits, 205-207 ; sponging on 
General Gourgaud, 208-215 ! 
stands for a seat in the 
Chamber, 216 ; founds the 
Société Pacifique, 216-219; 
his second candidature, 219 ; 
sponging again on M. 
Bernard,'2i9-222 ; congratu- 
lates Louis Napoleon on his 
elevation to the Presidency 
and requests an audience, 
225 ; is refused, 226 ; his 
insolence not forgotten, 227 ; 
writes to the President about 
Napoleon's unpaid legacy to 
him, 228 ; and receives an 
annuity as part of it, 229 ; 
wants 20,000 francs to go to 
Rome with, 230 ; starts an 
ink factory, obtains money 
from Count Walewski, but 
cannot get an interview, 231 ; 
finds money for the pre- 
liminary plans of a railway, 
232 ; a lawsuit over it, 233 ; 
tries to sell a Correggio which 
Cardinal Fesch had given 
him, 233, 234 ; wants to get 



married, 234 ; to the mother 
of his two illegitimate sons, 

234, 235 ; marries her, 235 ; 
obtains 60,000 francs from 
Napoleon ill., 236 ; his 
widowed mother comes to 
Paris and they are reconciled, 
239 ; before the legal pro- 
ceedings over her property 
are completed the Empire 
falls, 241 ; goes to London, 
sells his Imperial relics, re- 
turns to France, 242 ; his 
various homes in Paris, 
settles at Pontoise, 243 ; his 
poverty, 244 ; his death, 
245. 

Léon, Fernand, son of Comte 
Léon, 246. 

— Gaston, son of Comte Léon, 

235, 245, 246. 

— Mme, 235, 245. 

Lefèbvre - Desnoëttes, General, 

68, 69. 
Lerat de Magnitot, M., 141, 258- 

263. 
Leroy de Camilly, Adrien, 85, 

139- 
Lesieur, Mme, 177, 178, 199. 
LetuUe, M., 162, 163. 
Leuchtenberg, Duc de, 183. 
Leverd, Mlle, 267. 
Lille, 232. 
Lind, Jenny, 203. 
Loire, Mme, 79, So. 
London, 182-198, 242. 
Longchamps, Î\L de, 93. 
Louis xviil., 113, 123, 126, 127, 

183. 

— Napoleon. See Napoleon m. 

— Philippe, 177, 185. 
Luxbourg, Amélie de, 237, 

238. 



INDEX 



Luxbourg, Comte de, 119-121, 
131, 149, 151, 180, 202, 203, 
205, 207, 236-239. 

— Comtesse de, 71. See also 

Denuelle, Mlle Éléonore. 

Mac Donald, Adèle, 28, 29. 
Mâcon, the name under which 
Comte Léon was brought up, 

79- 

— General, 79, 80. 

— Mme, 80. 
Mahon, M., 207. 
Mainz, loô. 
Malmaison, 87. 
Malmesbury, Lord, 187. 
Mannheim, 149-151, 166. 
Marbois, Sophie de, 28. 
Marchais, Dr. Pierre, 73. 
Marchai, Major, 107. 
Marchand, M., 89. 
Marchangy, M. de, 49,52, 129, 130. 
Marcilly, M., 167. 

Marengo, 67. 

Margins, 16. 

Marie Antoinette, Queen, 22, 26. 
Louise, Empress, 90. 

Marienbourg, 135. 

Marius, André, 217. 

Martin, Mme, 79. 

Martinetti, Mme, 67. 

Masséna, Victorine, 28. 

Masson, M., 46, 92, 93, 125. 

Mauvières, Baron des, 83, 84, 138, 
139, 251,253,255-262. 

May, M., 160. 

Mayot, Colonel, 109. 

Mazères, M., 173-175. 

Meneval, Claude-François, Baron 
de, 81-83, 85, 86, 90, 139, 140, 
142, 147-157, 176, 179, 182, 
184, 185, 197, 251, 252, 254- 
262. 



Meneval, Mme, 82, 182. 
Mesnard, M., 246. 
Michel, Mme, 80. 

— I., 80, 8r, 
Miel, M., 150. 
Mittau, 113. 
Mole, Comte, 186. 
MoUien, General, 82. 
Monfrabœuf de Thenorgues, 168. 
Montholon, General, 89, 90, 186. 
Montluçon, 236. 

Montrouge, 80. 
Moquard, M., 225, 227. 
Morny, M., 232. 
Moulin, Maître, 188. 
Murat, Annette, 27. 

— Clotilde, 27. 

— Prince Joachim, afterwards 

King of Naples, 36, 50-53, 
57, 63, 64, 66, 67, 70, 88, 98, 
119, 125. 

— Princess Caroline, afterwards 

Queen of Naples, 28, 29, 49- 
52,56,63,66,67,74,80,93,98. 

Napoleon l., invites François 
Revel to his table, 17, 18 ; 
his bed shared by Éléonore 
Denuelle, 43 ; was he guilty 
of Revel's misfortunes ? 44, 
45 ; meets Eléonore at the 
house of Princess Murat, 56 ; 
Revel's account of the meet- 
ing, 64 ; the authentic 
account, 64-66 ; his house 
of pleasure, 68, 69 ; his 
natural son Léon born, 73 ; 
whilst he was in Poland, his 
first meeting with Mme 
Walewska, 74 ; begins to 
tire of Eléonore, 76 ; 
Chateaubriand on his 
manners, 77 ; forbids 



INDEX 



289 



Éléonore to present herself 
without permission, 78 ; ap- 
points a guardian for Léon, 
81-85 ; provides an income 
for Léon, 86 ; his affection 
for his two natural sons, 87, 
88 ; his legacy to Léon, 89 ; 
reviews the regiment in which 
Revel is, no; other (sup- 
posed) illegitimate children 
of his, 264-281. 

Napoleon ill., 68-70, 148, 178, 
182, 185-196, 214, 215, 225- 
230, 232, 234, 235. 

Neuilly, 140, 173, 174, 254. 

Ney, Marshal, 27. 

Oettingen - Wallerstein, Prince 

Ludwig von, 208. 
O'Meara, Dr, 183, 184. 
Orleans, 100. 
Orsay, Count d', 192-194. 
Otway, Sergeant, 193. 
Oudinot, Marshal, no. 

Paris, 19, 21, 25-27, 30, 32, 36, 
37, 39, 41, 46, 59, 60, 64, 65, 
68-70, 80, 81, 83-85, 92-99, 
loi, 115-117, 121-124, 129, 

^33, 134, 139, 148-150, 155- 
170, 172, 199-223, 225-243, 
248. 

Parquin, Colonel, 190-192, 194. 

Partridge, Inspector, 193. 

Pasquier, Chancellor, 95. 

Penzing, 106. 

Pierce, Chief Inspector, 193. 

Pingre, Mme, 58. 

Pontoise, 242-248. 

Preval, Colonel, 37. 

Prieur, Mme, 66, 67. 

Pultusk, 74. 

Quélen, Monseigneur de, 167. 
19 



Ratcliflfe, Lieutenant-Colonel, 191- 
196. 

Reichstadt, Duc de, 162. 

Reinecker, Philip, 121. 

Revel, François, 15 ; his birth 
and parentage, 16 ; his early 
marriage, enlistment in the 
army and promotion, his 
work on military administra- 
tion, 17 ; procures an invita- 
tion to General Bonaparte's 
table, retired on half pay, ob- 
tains a civil appointment, 18; 
paymaster in the army, 19 ; 
his honesty in question, 19, 
20 ; on the retired list, obtains 
occupation in Paris, 2 1 ; at the 
theatre, 23 ; is introduced to 
the occupants of a box, 24- 
26 ; dazzled by the daughter's 
charms, 26 ; is invited to visit 
their house, 30, 31 ; proposes 
for Eléonore, 32 ; present at 
a familyquarrel,andadvances 
money, 33 ; wants his money 
returned, 34 ; an interview 
with Mme Campan, 35 ; he 
obtains her help, 36 ; the 
marriage contract executed, 
the marriage, 37 ; this is his 
own story so far, 38 ; married 
bliss, 39 ; his suspicions 
aroused, 40, 41 ; he is 
arrested for forgery, 41, 42 ; 
and imprisoned, 43 ; though 
the prosecutor dropped the 
case the law took its course, 
45 ; he is removed to 
Versailles, obtains Maître 
Lebon as his counsel, 46 ; 
his dissatisfaction with Le- 
bon and his earlier pane- 
gyrics of him, 47, 48 ; his 



290 



INDEX 



penalty modified, 49; through 
the influence of those whom 
he accused of injuring him, 
50-52 ; his conflicting stories, 
53, 54; his "dossier," 55-57 ; 
he complains of his prison 
fare and is removed to 
another jail, 57 ; his wife 
sues for a divorce, 59 ; which 
is granted, 90 ; his poem on 
the history of his marriage, 
his release, 81 ; his sentence 
at Dourdan expires and he 
returns to Paris, 92 ; his 
attempts to raise money, is 
wanted by the police, 93 ; 
who search his papers, 95, 
97, 98 ; his " Six Months of 
My Life," 98 ; he is forbidden 
to stop in Paris and sent 
to Tours, 99 ; is gazetted 
lieutenant and sent to 
Besançon, meets his wife's 
family there, asks for leave 
to visit Paris, loi ; and is 
refused, present at the battle 
of Wagram, 105 ; in hospital 
at Worms, 107 ; his accounts 
in confusion again, 108 ; 
transferred to another regi- 
ment and sent to Holland, 
109 ; his regiment reviewed 
by Napoleon, no ; retired on 
a pension, in ; goes to live 
in Hamburg, 112; tries 
unsuccessfully for a fresh 
army appointment, 113-116; 
commences a suit for nullity 
of divorce, 121 ; enlists in the 
Royal Volunteers, 122 ; pub- 
lishes his " Bonaparte et 
Murat, ravisseurs," 125 ; 
resumes his nullity suit, 127 ; 



his bogus charge of bigamy 
against Eleonore, 131-135 ; 
writes his Mémoires, but does 
not publish, 136 ; his suit 
against the boy Léon, 136- 
139 ; a further suit when 
Léon comes of age, 142 ; 
documents in the two cases, 
251-263 ; his death, 143 ; his 
account of the Comte de 
Luxbourg, 203. 

Revel, Jean, 16. 

Reynaud de Saint-Jean d'Angely, 
Etienne, 68, 116-118, 132, 

133- 
Rheims, 122. 
Rivaud, General, 105. 
Rolier, Mile, 69. 
Romanovich, M., 159. 
Rome, 170, 230. 
Rosenberg, Baron de, 159-161. 
Rothschild, Jacob, 234. 
Ruzot, Charlotte, 17. 

Saillard, Baron, 164. 

Saint-Cyr, 67. 

Saint-Denis, 172-177, 208, 216, 

219, 224, 226, 235, 246. 
Saint-Germain, 27, 28, 32, 36, 37, 

39-42, 56, 126. 
Saint-Germain-en-Laye, 246. 
St. Helena, 87, 88, 200, 208. 
Saint-Laurent, Mme de, the 

name under which Eleonore 

Denuelle passed, 71. 
St. Petersburg, 120, 183. 
Samur, 67. 

Sanctuari, Lieutenant-Colonel, 37. 
Saurimont, Mme, 217. 
Savory, Due de, in. 
Schonbrunn, 106. 
Sivert, Herr, 113. 
Sorel, M., 38, 42, 45. 



INDEX 



291 



Strantz, Ferdinand von, 203. 
Strassbourg, 150, 151, 185, igo. 
Stuttgart, 120. 

Tascher de la Pagerie, Stéphanie, 

Tobolsk, 206. 
Toulon, 112. 
Toulouse, 242. 
Tourillon, Mlle, 242. 
Tours, 99, 100, 236. 

Vaton, V., 68, 69. 

Vendôme, 246. 

Versailles, 26, 46, 48, 54, 57, 60, 

128. 
Veyrat, François, 95. 
— Hugues, 94-96, 124. 
Vieillard, Captain, 149, 150, 152. 
Viel-Castel, M., 87, 90. 
Vienna, 105, 106, 237. 



Vignolles, General, 105. 

Villemessant, M., 165. 

Vilna, 135. 

Vitz-sur-Authie, 247. 

Vogt von Hunolstein, Baroness, 

120. 
Vouillon, M., 198. 

Wagram, 105. 

Walewska, Mme, 74, 75, 86, 266. 

Walewski, Comte, 87, 88, 226 

227, 229, 231, 232. 
Warsaw, 74. 
Waterloo, 86, 123, 213. 
Wille, Ritter Franz von, 237. 
Wimbledon, 192, 193. 
Worms, 107, 108. 
Wiirtzburg, 237. 

York, Duchess of, 158. 
Zwolle, no. 



Printed by 

Morrison & Gibb Limited 

Edinburgh 



1 



« -4 19^5 



